Welcome to the Cloud Bulk Object Storage Resources Center

Updated 8/31/19

Cloud Bulk Big Data Software Defined Object Storage Resources

server storage I/O trends Object Storage resources

Welcome to the Cloud, Big Data, Software Defined, Bulk and Object Storage Resources Center Page objectstoragecenter.com.

This object storage resources, along with software defined, cloud, bulk, and scale-out storage page is part of the server StorageIOblog microsite collection of resources. Software-defined, Bulk, Cloud and Object Storage exist to support expanding and diverse application data demands.

Other related resources include:

  • Software Defined, Cloud, Bulk and Object Storage Fundamentals
  • Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book (CRC Press)
  • Cloud, Software Defined, Scale-Out, Object Storage News Trends
  •  Object storage SDDC SDDI
    Via Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017)

    Bulk, Cloud, Object Storage Solutions and Services

    There are various types of cloud, bulk, and object storage including public services such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) Simple Storage Service (S3), Backblaze, Google, Microsoft Azure, IBM Softlayer, Rackspace among many others. There are also solutions for hybrid and private deployment from Cisco, Cloudian, CTERA, Cray, DDN, Dell EMC, Elastifile, Fujitsu, Vantera/HDS, HPE, Hedvig, Huawei, IBM, NetApp, Noobaa, OpenIO, OpenStack, Quantum, Rackspace, Rozo, Scality, Spectra, Storpool, StorageCraft, Suse, Swift, Virtuozzo, WekaIO, WD, among many others.

    Bulk Cloud Object storage SDDC SDDI
    Via Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017)

    Cloud products and services among others, along with associated data infrastructures including object storage, file systems, repositories and access methods are at the center of bulk, big data, big bandwidth and little data initiatives on a public, private, hybrid and community basis. After all, not everything is the same in cloud, virtual and traditional data centers or information factories from active data to in-active deep digital archiving.

    Object Context Matters

    Before discussing Object Storage lets take a step back and look at some context that can clarify some confusion around the term object. The word object has many different meanings and context, both inside of the IT world as well as outside. Context matters with the term object such as a verb being a thing that can be seen or touched as well as a person or thing of action or feeling directed towards.

    Besides a person, place or physical thing, an object can be a software-defined data structure that describes something. For example, a database record describing somebody’s contact or banking information, or a file descriptor with name, index ID, date and time stamps, permissions and access control lists along with other attributes or metadata. Another example is an object or blob stored in a cloud or object storage system repository, as well as an item in a hypervisor, operating system, container image or other application.

    Besides being a verb, an object can also be a noun such as disapproval or disagreement with something or someone. From an IT context perspective, an object can also refer to a programming method (e.g. object-oriented programming [oop], or Java [among other environments] objects and classes) and systems development in addition to describing entities with data structures.

    In other words, a data structure describes an object that can be a simple variable, constant, complex descriptor of something being processed by a program, as well as a function or unit of work. There are also objects unique or with context to specific environments besides Java or databases, operating systems, hypervisors, file systems, cloud and other things.

    The Need For Bulk, Cloud and Object Storage

    There is no such thing as an information recession with more data being generated, moved, processed, stored, preserved and served, granted there are economic realities. Likewise as a society our dependence on information being available for work or entertainment, from medical healthcare to social media and all points in between continues to increase (check out the Human Face of Big Data).

    In addition, people and data are living longer, as well as getting larger (hence little data, big data and very big data). Cloud products and services along with associated object storage, file systems, repositories and access methods are at the center of big data, big bandwidth and little data initiatives on a public, private, hybrid and community basis. After all, not everything is the same in cloud, virtual and traditional data centers or information factories from active data to in-active deep digital archiving.

    Click here to view (and hear) more content including cloud and object storage fundamentals

    Click here to view software defined, bulk, cloud and object storage trend news

    cloud object storage

    Where to learn more

    The following resources provide additional information about big data, bulk, software defined, cloud and object storage.



    Via InfoStor: Object Storage Is In Your Future
    Via FujiFilm IT Summit: Software Defined Data Infrastructures (SDDI) and Hybrid Clouds
    Via MultiChannel: After ditching cloud business, Verizon inks Virtual Network Services deal with Amazon
    Via MultiChannel: Verizon Digital Media Services now offers integrated Microsoft Azure Storage
    Via StorageIOblog: AWS EFS Elastic File System (Cloud NAS) First Preview Look
    Via InfoStor: Cloud Storage Concerns, Considerations and Trends
    Via InfoStor: Object Storage Is In Your Future
    Via Server StorageIO: April 2015 Newsletter Focus on Cloud and Object storage
    Via StorageIOblog: AWS S3 Cross Region Replication storage enhancements
    Cloud conversations: AWS EBS, Glacier and S3 overview
    AWS (Amazon) storage gateway, first, second and third impressions
    Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Book)

    View more news, trends and related cloud object storage activity here.

    Videos and podcasts at storageio.tv also available via Applie iTunes.

    Human Face of Big Data
    Human Face of Big Data (Book review)

    Seven Databases in Seven weeks Seven Databases in Seven Weeks (Book review)

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    Object and cloud storage are in your future, the questions are when, where, with what and how among others.

    Watch for more content and links to be added here soon to this object storage center page including posts, presentations, pod casts, polls, perspectives along with services and product solutions profiles.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    Cloud conversations: Gaining cloud confidence from insights into AWS outages (Part II)

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    This is the second in a two-part industry trends and perspective looking at learning from cloud incidents, view part I here.

    There is good information, insight and lessons to be learned from cloud outages and other incidents.

    Sorry cynics no that does not mean an end to clouds, as they are here to stay. However when and where to use them, along with what best practices, how to be ready and configure for use are part of the discussion. This means that clouds may not be for everybody or all applications, or at least today. For those who are into clouds for the long haul (either all in or partially) including current skeptics, there are many lessons to be  learned and leveraged.

    In order to gain confidence in clouds, some questions that I routinely am asked include are clouds more or less reliable than what you are doing? Depends on what you are doing, and how you will be using the cloud services. If you are applying HA and other BC or resiliency best practices, you may be able to configure and isolate from the more common situations. On the other hand, if you are simply using the cloud services as a low-cost alternative selecting the lowest price and service class (SLAs and SLOs), you might get what you paid for. Thus, clouds are a shared responsibility, the service provider has things they need to do, and the user or person designing how the service will be used have some decisions making responsibilities.

    Keep in mind that high availability (HA), resiliency, business continuance (BC) along with disaster recovery (DR) are the sum of several pieces. This includes people, best practices, processes including change management, good design eliminating points of failure and isolating or containing faults, along with how the components  or technology used (e.g. hardware, software, networks, services, tools). Good technology used in goods ways can be part of a highly resilient flexible and scalable data infrastructure. Good technology used in the wrong ways may not leverage the solutions to their full potential.

    While it is easy to focus on the physical technologies (servers, storage, networks, software, facilities), many of the cloud services incidents or outages have involved people, process and best practices so those need to be considered.

    These incidents or outages bring awareness, a level set, that this is still early in the cloud evolution lifecycle and to move beyond seeing clouds as just a way to cut cost, and seeing the importance and value HA, resiliency, BC and DR. This means learning from mistakes, taking action to correct or fix errors, find and cut points of failure are part of a technology maturing or the use of it. These all tie into having services with service level agreements (SLAs) with service level objectives (SLOs) for availability, reliability, durability, accessibility, performance and security among others to protect against mayhem or other things that can and do happen.

    Images licensed for use by StorageIO via
    Atomazul / Shutterstock.com

    The reason I mentioned earlier that AWS had another incident is that like their peers or competitors who have incidents in the past, AWS appears to be going through some growing, maturing, evolution related activities. During summer 2012 there was an AWS incident that affected Netflix (read more here: AWS and the Netflix Fix?). It should also be noted that there were earlier AWS outages where Netflix (read about Netflix architecture here) leveraged resiliency designs to try and prevent mayhem when others were impacted.

    Is AWS a lightning rod for things to happen, a point of attraction for Mayhem and others?

    Granted given their size, scope of services and how being used on a global basis AWS is blazing new territory and experiences, similar to what other information services delivery platforms did in the past. What I mean is that while taken for granted today, open systems Unix, Linux, Windows-based along with client-server, midrange or distributed systems, not to mention mainframe hardware, software, networks, processes, procedures, best practices all went through growing pains.

    There are a couple of interesting threads going on over in various LinkedIn Groups based on some reporters stories including on speculation of what happened, followed with some good discussions of what actually happened and how to prevent recurrence of them in the future.

    Over in the Cloud Computing, SaaS & Virtualization group forum, this thread is based on a Forbes article (Amazon AWS Takes Down Netflix on Christmas Eve) and involves conversations about SLAs, best practices, HA and related themes. Have a look at the story the thread is based on and some of the assertions being made, and ensuing discussions.

    Also over at LinkedIn, in the Cloud Hosting & Service Providers group forum, this thread is based on a story titled Why Netflix’ Christmas Eve Crash Was Its Own Fault with a good discussion on clouds, HA, BC, DR, resiliency and related themes.

    Over at the Virtualization Practice, there is a piece titled Is Amazon Ruining Public Cloud Computing? with comments from me and Adrian Cockcroft (@Adrianco) a Netflix Architect (you can read his blog here). You can also view some presentations about the Netflix architecture here.

    What this all means

    Saying you get what you pay for would be too easy and perhaps not applicable.

    There are good services free, or low-cost, just like good free content and other things, however vice versa, just because something costs more, does not make it better.

    Otoh, there are services that charge a premium however may have no better if not worse reliability, same with content for fee or perceived value that is no better than what you get free.

    Additional related material

    Some closing thoughts:

    • Clouds are real and can be used safely; however, they are a shared responsibility.
    • Only you can prevent cloud data loss, which means do your homework, be ready.
    • If something can go wrong, it probably will, particularly if humans are involved.
    • Prepare for the unexpected and clarify assumptions vs. realities of service capabilities.
    • Leverage fault isolation and containment to prevent rolling or spreading disasters.
    • Look at cloud services beyond lowest cost or for cost avoidance.
    • What is your organizations culture for learning from mistakes vs. fixing blame?
    • Ask yourself if you, your applications and organization are ready for clouds.
    • Ask your cloud providers if they are ready for you and your applications.
    • Identify what your cloud concerns are to decide what can be done about them.
    • Do a proof of concept to decide what types of clouds and services are best for you.

    Do not be scared of clouds, however be ready, do your homework, learn from the mistakes, misfortune and errors of others. Establish and leverage known best practices while creating new ones. Look at the past for guidance to the future, however avoid clinging to, and bringing the baggage of the past to the future. Use new technologies, tools and techniques in new ways vs. using them in old ways.

    Ok, nuff said.

    Cheers gs

    Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press, 2011), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press, 2009), and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier, 2004)

    twitter @storageio

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC All Rights Reserved

    Cloud conversations: Gaining cloud confidence from insights into AWS outages

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    This is the first of a two-part industry trends and perspectives series looking at how to learn from cloud outages (read part II here).

    In case you missed it, there were some public cloud outages during the recent Christmas 2012-holiday season. One incident involved Microsoft Xbox (view the Microsoft Azure status dashboard here) users were impacted, and the other was another Amazon Web Services (AWS) incident. Microsoft and AWS are not alone, most if not all cloud services have had some type of incident and have gone on to improve from those outages. Google has had issues with different applications and services including some in December 2012 along with a Gmail incident that received covered back in 2011.

    For those interested, here is a link to the AWS status dashboard and a link to the AWS December 24 2012 incident postmortem. In the case of the recent AWS incident which affected users such as Netflix, the incident (read the AWS postmortem and Netflix postmortem) was tied to a human error. This is not to say AWS has more outages or incidents vs. others including Microsoft, it just seems that we hear more about AWS when things happen compared to others. That could be due to AWS size and arguably market leading status, diversity of services and scale at which some of their clients are using them.

    Btw, if you were not aware, Microsoft Azure is more than just about supporting SQLserver, Exchange, SharePoint or Office, it is also an IaaS layer for running virtual machines such as Hyper-V, as well as a storage target for storing data. You can use Microsoft Azure storage services as a target for backing up or archiving or as general storage, similar to using AWS S3 or Rackspace Cloud files or other services. Some backup and archiving AaaS and SaaS providers including Evault partner with Microsoft Azure as a storage repository target.

    When reading some of the coverage of these recent cloud incidents, I am not sure if I am more amazed by some of the marketing cloud washing, or the cloud bashing and uniformed reporting or lack of research and insight. Then again, if someone repeats a myth often enough for others to hear and repeat, as it gets amplified, the myth may assume status of reality. After all, you may know the expression that if it is on the internet then it must be true?

    Images licensed for use by StorageIO via
    Atomazul / Shutterstock.com

    Have AWS and public cloud services become a lightning rod for when things go wrong?

    Here is some coverage of various cloud incidents:

    The above are a small sampling of different stories, articles, columns, blogs, perspectives about cloud services outages or other incidents. Assuming the services are available, you can Google or Bing many others along with reading postmortems to gain insight into what happened, the cause, effect and how to prevent in the future.

    Do these recent incidents show a trend of increased cloud outages? Alternatively, do they say that the cloud services are being used more and on a larger basis, thus the impacts become more known?

    Perhaps it is a mix of the above, and like when a magnetic storage tape gets lost or stolen, it makes for good news or copy, something to write about. Granted there are fewer tapes actually lost than in the past, and far fewer vs. lost or stolen laptops and other devices with data on them. There are probably other reasons such as the lightning rod effect given how much industry hype around clouds that when something does happen, the cynics or foes come out in force, sometimes with FUD.

    Similar to traditional hardware or software based product vendors, some service providers have even tried to convince me that they have never had an incident, lost or corrupted or compromised any data, yeah, right. Candidly, I put more credibility and confidence in a vendor or solution provider who tells me that they have had incidents and taken steps to prevent them from recurring. Granted those steps might be made public while others might be under NDA, at least they are learning and implementing improvements.

    As part of gaining insights, here are some links to AWS, Google, Microsoft Azure and other service status dashboards where you can view current and past situations.

    What is your take on IT clouds? Click here to cast your vote and see what others are thinking about clouds.

    Ok, nuff said for now (check out part II here )

    Disclosure: I am a customer of AWS for EC2, EBS, S3 and Glacier as well as a customer of Bluehost for hosting and Rackspace for backups. Other than Amazon being a seller of my books (and my blog via Kindle) along with running ads on my sites and being an Amazon Associates member (Google also has ads), none of those mentioned are or have been StorageIO clients.

    Cheers gs

    Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press, 2011), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press, 2009), and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier, 2004)

    twitter @storageio

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC All Rights Reserved

    Trick or treat and vendor fun games

    In the spirit of Halloween and zombies season, a couple of thoughts come to mind about vendor tricks and treats. This is an industry trends and perspectives post, part of an ongoing series looking at various technology and fun topics.

    The first trick or treat game pertains to the blame game; you know either when something breaks, or at the other extreme, before you have even made a decision to buy something. The trick or treat game for decision-making goes something like this.

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Vendor “A” says products succeed with their solution while failure results with a solution from “B” when doing “X”. Otoh, vendor “B” claims that “X” will fail when using a solution from vendor “A”. In fact, you can pick what you want to substitute for “X”, perhaps VDI, PCIe, Big Data, Little Data, Backup, Archive, Analytics, Private Cloud, Public Cloud, Hybrid Cloud, eDiscovery you name it.

    This is not complicated math or big data problem requiring a high-performance computing (HPC) platform. A HPC Zetta-Flop processing ability using 512 bit addressing of 9.9 (e.g. 1 nine) PettaBytes of battery-backed DRAM and an IO capability of 9.99999 (e.g. 5 9’s) trillion 8 bit IOPS to do table pivots or runge kutta numerical analysis, map reduce, SAS or another modeling with optional iProduct or Android interface are not needed.

    image of StorageIO big data HPC cloud storageimage of StorageIO big data HPC cloud storage
    StorageIO images of touring Texas Advanced Computing (e.g. HPC) Center

    Can you solve this equation? Hint it does not need a PhD or any other advanced degree. Another hint, if you have ever been at any side of the technology product and services decision-making table, regardless of the costume you wore, you should know the answer.

    Of course the question of would “X” fail regardless of who or what “A” or “B” let alone a “C”, “D” or “F”? In other words, it is not the solution, technology, vendor or provider, rather the problem or perhaps even lack thereof that is the issue. Or is it a case where there is a solution from “A”, “B” or any others that is looking for a problem, and if it is the wrong problem, there can be a wrong solution thus failure?

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Another trick or treat game is vendors public relations (PR) or analyst relations (AR) people to ask for one thing and delivery or ask another. For example, some vendor, service provider, their marketing AR and PR people or surrogates make contact wanting to tell of various success and failure story. Of course, this is usually their success and somebody else’s failure, or their victory over something or someone who sometimes can be interesting. Of course, there are also the treats to get you to listen to the above, such as tempt you with a project if you meet with their subject, which may be a trick of a disappearing treat (e.g. magic, poof it is gone after the discussion).

    There are another AR and PR trick and treat where they offer on behalf of their representative organization or client to a perspective or exclusive insight on their competitor. Of course, the treat from their perspective is that they will generously expose all that is wrong with what a competitor is saying about their own (e.g. the competitors) product.

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Let me get this straight, I am not supposed to believe what somebody says about his or her own product, however, supposed to believe what a competitor says is wrong with the competition’s product, and what is right with his or her own product.

    Hmm, ok, so let me get this straight, a competitor say “A” wants to tell me what somebody say from “B” has told me is wrong and I should schedule a visit with a truth squad member from “A” to get the record set straight about “B”?

    Does that mean then that I go to “B” for a rebuttal, as well as an update about “A” from “B”, assuming that what “A” has told me is also false about themselves, and perhaps about “B” or any other?

    Too be fair, depending on your level of trust and confidence in either a vendor, their personal or surrogates, you might tend to believe more from them vs. others, or at least until you been tricked after given treats. There may be some that have been tricked, or they tried applying to many treats to present a story that behind the costume might be a bit scary.

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Having been through enough of these, and I candidly believe that sometimes “A” or “B” or any other party actually do believe that they have more or better info about their competitor and that they can convince somebody about what their competitor is doing better than the competitor can. I also believe that there are people out there who will go to “A” or “B” and believe what they are told by based on their preference, bias or interests.

    When I hear from vendors, VARs, solution or service providers and others, it’s interesting hearing point, counterpoint and so forth, however if time is limited, I’am more interested in hearing from such as “A” about them, what they are doing, where success, where challenges, where going and if applicable, under NDA go into more detail.

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Customer success stories are good, however again, if interested in what works, what kind of works, or what does not work, chances are when looking for G2 vs. GQ, a non-scripted customer conversation or perspective of the good, the bad and the ugly is preferred, even if under NDA. Again, if time is limited which it usually is, focus on what is being done with your solution, where it is going and if compelled send follow-up material that can of course include MUD and FUD about others if that is your preference.

    Then there is when during a 30 minute briefing, the vendor or solution provider is still talking about trends, customer pain points, what competitors are doing at 21 minutes into the call with no sign of an announcement, update or news in site

    Lets not forget about the trick where the vendor marketing or PR person reaches out and says that the CEO, CMO, CTO or some other CxO or Chief Jailable Officer (CJO) wants to talk with you. Part of the trick is when the CxO actually makes it to the briefing and is not ready, does not know why the call is occurring, or, thinks that a request for an audience has been made with them for an interview or something else.

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    A treat is when 3 to 4 minutes into a briefing, the vendor or solution provider has already framed up what and why they are doing something. This means getting to what they are announcing or planning on doing and getting into a conversation to discuss what they are doing and making good follow-up content and resources available.

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Sometimes a treat is when a briefer goes on autopilot nailing their script for 29 of a 30 minute session then use the last-minute to ask if there are any questions. The reason autopilot briefings can be a treat is when they are going over what is in the slide deck, webex, or press release thus affording an opportunity to get caught up on other things while talk at you. Hmm, perhaps need to consider playing some tricks in reward for those kind of treats? ;)

    StorageIO industry trends cloud, virtualization and big data

    Do not be scared, not everybody is out to trick you with treats, and not all treats have tricks attached to them. Be prepared, figure out who is playing tricks with treats, and who has treats without tricks.

    Oh, and as a former IT customer, vendor and analyst, one of my favorites is contact information of my dogs to vendors who require registration on their websites for basic things such as data sheets. Another is supplying contact information of competing vendors sales reps to vendors who also require registration for basic data sheets or what should otherwise be generally available information as opposed to more premium treats. Of course there are many more fun tricks, however lets leave those alone for now.

    Note: Zombie voting rules apply which means vote early, vote often, and of course vote for those who cannot include those that are dead (real or virtual).

    Where To Learn More

    View additiona related material via the following links.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    Watch out for tricks and treats, have a safe and fun Zombie (aka Halloween) season. See you while out and about this fall and don’t forget to take part in the ongoing zombie technology poll. Oh, and be safe with trick or treat and vendor fun games

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2018. Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    What is the best kind of IO? The one you do not have to do

    What is the best kind of IO? The one you do not have to do

    data infrastructure server storage I/O trends

    Updated 2/10/2018

    What is the best kind of IO? If no IO (input/output) operation is the best IO, than the second best IO is the one that can be done as close to the application and processor with best locality of reference. Then the third best IO is the one that can be done in less time, or at least cost or impact to the requesting application which means moving further down the memory and storage stack (figure 1).

    Storage and IO or I/O locality of reference and storage hirearchy
    Figure 1 memory and storage hierarchy

    The problem with IO is that they are basic operation to get data into and out of a computer or processor so they are required; however, they also have an impact on performance, response or wait time (latency). IO require CPU or processor time and memory to set up and then process the results as well as IO and networking resources to move data to their destination or retrieve from where stored. While IOs cannot be eliminated, their impact can be greatly improved or optimized by doing fewer of them via caching, grouped reads or writes (pre-fetch, write behind) among other techniques and technologies.

    Think of it this way, instead of going on multiple errands, sometimes you can group multiple destinations together making for a shorter, more efficient trip; however, that optimization may also take longer. Hence sometimes it makes sense to go on a couple of quick, short low latency trips vs. one single larger one that takes half a day however accomplishes many things. Of course, how far you have to go on those trips (e.g. locality) makes a difference of how many you can do in a given amount of time.

    What is locality of reference?

    Locality of reference refers to how close (e.g location) data exists for where it is needed (being referenced) for use. For example, the best locality of reference in a computer would be registers in the processor core, then level 1 (L1), level 2 (L2) or level 3 (L3) onboard cache, followed by dynamic random access memory (DRAM). Then would come memory also known as storage on PCIe cards such as nand flash solid state device (SSD) or accessible via an adapter on a direct attached storage (DAS), SAN or NAS device. In the case of a PCIe nand flash SSD card, even though physically the nand flash SSD is closer to the processor, there is still the overhead of traversing the PCIe bus and associated drivers. To help offset that impact, PCIe cards use DRAM as cache or buffers for data along with Meta or control information to further optimize and improve locality of reference. In other words, help with cache hits, cache use and cache effectiveness vs. simply boosting cache utilization.

    Where To Learn More

    View additional NAS, NVMe, SSD, NVM, SCM, Data Infrastructure and HDD related topics via the following links.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    What can you do the cut the impact of IO

    • Establish baseline performance and availability metrics for comparison
    • Realize that IOs are a fact of IT virtual, physical and cloud life
    • Understand what is a bad IO along with its impact
    • Identify why an IO is bad, expensive or causing an impact
    • Find and fix the problem, either with software, application or database changes
    • Throw more software caching tools, hyper visors or hardware at the problem
    • Hardware includes faster processors with more DRAM and fast internal busses
    • Leveraging local PCIe flash SSD cards for caching or as targets
    • Utilize storage systems or appliances that have intelligent caching and storage optimization capabilities (performance, availability, capacity).
    • Compare changes and improvements to baseline, quantify improvement

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    As the Hard Disk Drive HDD continues to spin

    As the Hard Disk Drive HDD continues to spin

    server storage data infrastructure i/o iop hdd ssd trends

    Updated 2/10/2018

    Despite having been repeatedly declared dead at the hands of some new emerging technology over the past several decades, the Hard Disk Drive (HDD) continues to spin and evolve as it moves towards its 60th birthday.

    More recently HDDs have been declared dead due to flash SSD that according to some predictions, should have caused the HDD to be extinct by now.

    Meanwhile, having not yet died in addition to having qualified for its AARP membership a few years ago, the HDD continues to evolve in capacity, smaller form factor, performance, reliability, density along with cost improvements.

    Back in 2006 I did an article titled Happy 50th, hard drive, but will you make it to 60?

    IMHO it is safe to say that the HDD will be around for at least a few more years if not another decade (or more).

    This is not to say that the HDD has outlived its usefulness or that there are not other tiered storage mediums to do specific jobs or tasks better (there are).

    Instead, the HDD continues to evolve and is complimented by flash SSD in a way that HDDs are complimenting magnetic tape (another declared dead technology) each finding new roles to support more data being stored for longer periods of time.

    After all, there is no such thing as a data or information recession!

    What the importance of this is about technology tiering and resource alignment, matching the applicable technology to the task at hand.

    Technology tiering (Servers, storage, networking, snow removal) is about aligning the applicable resource that is best suited to a particular need in a cost as well as productive manner. The HDD remains a viable tiered storage medium that continues to evolve while taking on new roles coexisting with SSD and tape along with cloud resources. These and other technologies have their place which ideally is finding or expanding into new markets instead of simply trying to cannibalize each other for market share.

    Here is a link to a good story by Lucas Mearian on the history or evolution of the hard disk drive (HDD) including how a 1TB device that costs about $60 today would have cost about a trillion dollars back in the 1950s. FWIW, IMHO the 1 trillion dollars is low and should be more around 2 to 5 trillion for the one TByte if you apply common costs for management, people, care and feeding, power, cooling, backup, BC, DR and other functions.

    Where To Learn More

    View additional NAS, NVMe, SSD, NVM, SCM, Data Infrastructure and HDD related topics via the following links.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    IMHO, it is safe to say that the HDD is here to stay for at least a few more years (if not decades) or at least until someone decides to try a new creative marketing approach by declaring it dead (again).

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    What is DFR or Data Footprint Reduction?

    What is DFR or Data Footprint Reduction?

    What is DFR or Data Footprint Reduction?

    Updated 10/9/2018

    What is DFR or Data Footprint Reduction?

    Data Footprint Reduction (DFR) is a collection of techniques, technologies, tools and best practices that are used to address data growth management challenges. Dedupe is currently the industry darling for DFR particularly in the scope or context of backup or other repetitive data.

    However DFR expands the scope of expanding data footprints and their impact to cover primary, secondary along with offline data that ranges from high performance to inactive high capacity.

    Consequently the focus of DFR is not just on reduction ratios, its also about meeting time or performance rates and data protection windows.

    This means DFR is about using the right tool for the task at hand to effectively meet business needs, and cost objectives while meeting service requirements across all applications.

    Examples of DFR technologies include Archiving, Compression, Dedupe, Data Management and Thin Provisioning among others.

    Read more about DFR in Part I and Part II of a two part series found here and here.

    Where to learn more

    Learn more about data footprint reducton (DFR), data footprint overhead and related topics via the following links:

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What this all means

    That is all for now, hope you find these ongoing series of current or emerging Industry Trends and Perspectives posts of interest.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Cheers Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2018. Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    Server Storage I/O Network Virtualization Whats Next?

    Server Storage I/O Network Virtualization Whats Next?
    Server Storage I/O Network Virtualization Whats Next?
    Updated 9/28/18

    There are many faces and thus functionalities of virtualization beyond the one most commonly discussed which is consolidation or aggregation. Other common forms of virtualization include emulation (which is part of enabling consolidation) which can be in the form of a virtual tape library for storage to bridge new disk technology to old software technology, processes, procedures and skill sets. Other forms of virtualization functionality for life beyond consolidation include abstraction for transparent movement of applications or operating systems on servers, or data on storage to support planned and un-planned maintenance, upgrades, BC/DR and other activities.

    So the gist is that there are many forms of virtualization technologies and techniques for servers, storage and even I/O networks to address different issues including life beyond consolidation. However the next wave of consolidation could and should be that of reducing the number of logical images, or, the impact of the multiple operating systems and application images, along with their associated management costs.

    This may be easier said than done, however, for those looking to cut costs even further than from what can be realized by reducing physical footprints (e.g. going from 10 to 1 or from 250 to 25 physical servers), there could be upside however it will come at a cost. The cost is like that of reducing data and storage footprint impacts with such as data management and archiving.

    Savings can be realized by archiving and deleting data via data management however that is easier said than done given the cost in terms of people time and ability to decide what to archive, even for non-compliance data along with associated business rules and policies to be defined (for automation) along with hardware, software and services (managed services, consulting and/or cloud and SaaS).

    Where To Learn More

    View additional NAS, NVMe, SSD, NVM, SCM, Data Infrastructure and HDD related topics via the following links.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2018. Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.