Deploying a Cloud Storage Infrastructure - making the promise reality

Deploying a Cloud Storage Infrastructure - making the promise reality

Deploying a Cloud Storage Infrastructure - making the promise reality

Adrian Groeneveld

Marketing Director, EMEA

Adrian Groeneveld

Marketing Director, EMEA

Market DynamicsMarket Dynamics

Economic meltdown

Virtualisation is mainstream

Cloud computing on everyone’s discussion agenda

Unified everything

Companies forced to adopt a new approach

Storage at the centre of everything

The Storage IssuesThe Storage Issues

Silo’d or fragmented storage through project driven

acquisition

Poor utilisation

Highly inefficient due to power, space and resource

overhead

Legacy storage scales poorly, creating bottlenecks

Sharing storage between applications creates contention

and missed SLAs

Cloud - A Simple UnderstandingCloud - A Simple Understanding

Private Cloud– Typically an internal shared compute environment to support

business units/divisions and internal applications

Public Cloud– Typically an external organisation using their own infrastructure

to deliver services to multiple clients e.g. SalesForce.com

Cloud Benefits– Efficiency of resource– Flexible shared environment– Simple resource allocation– Simplified management– Project based charge back

Obstacles to Successful Cloud Storage InfrastructureObstacles to Successful Cloud Storage Infrastructure

How unified is unified?

Applications don’t like sharing

Issues around scalability

Who’s using what

Securing the Infrastructure

Allocation of resources

Resource prioritisation

“Pillar delivers an innovative next generation data storage solution enabled by patented Quality of Service technology and built on a highly scalable modular architecture to automatically regulate and manage fulfillment of incoming application data requests based on business importance.”

One Key Enabling Technology:

Pillar Quality of Service

Enabling Cloud Storage

Enabling the Virtual Datacentre

Enabling Faster Applications

Enabling More Usage with Less Costs

9

How Do We Do It?How Do We Do It?

One Platform: One Platform: Axiom 600Axiom 600

Key Value: Key Value: IO PrioritizationIO Prioritization

Virtual Server

Virtual Machine 2

Virtual Machine 1

Virtual Machine 3

1 3

9

4 5

8

10

7

2 6

Medium Priority Queue

high medium low

High Priority Queue

Low Priority Queue

Core Technology: Core Technology: QoSQoS

One Platform: Axiom 600One Platform: Axiom 600

4x SAN and/or NAS Slammers – SAN (FC, iSCSI)

4-16 4Gbps and/or 8Gbps FC ports 4-16 1Gbps Ethernet ports

– NAS (NFS or CIFS) 8-32 1Gbps Ethernet ports

– 48-192 GB of Cache 64x Bricks

– 1.66 PB of Capacity– Storage Classes

SATA: 500GB, 1TB and 2TB FC: 300GB and 450GB SSD: 50GB and 200GB

Guarantees– Performance guarantee with 80% Utilization

Pillar Axiom Modular ScalingPillar Axiom Modular Scaling

Pilot

Slammer

Slammer

Bricks

True Performance Scalability: ProofTrue Performance Scalability: Proof

Differentiating Cloud TechnologiesDifferentiating Cloud Technologies

Quality of Service (QoS)– Dynamic CPU, Cache, and Capacity Management

Unified Storage– Native SAN & Native NAS shared storage pool

Distributed RAID– Linear Scaling, Performance under fault, fast rebuild

Policy based Management & Application Aware Profiles– Storage services linked to application priority

Modular architecture– Scale with highest utilization rates in enterprise storage

Quality of ServiceQuality of Service

Problem: Traditional arrays still use a FIFO (First in First

Out) I/O queuing model– No regard for the business importance of an application – first

come first served

Solution: Prioritize I/O’s by the business value of an

application– Multiple I/O queues: Important I/O’s executed first regardless of

received order

Benefit: Aligns performance with business needs vs.

who got there first

How we do it: QoS Control PointsHow we do it: QoS Control Points

Storage Domains – Extending QoS in the CloudStorage Domains – Extending QoS in the Cloud

Isolates specific bricks within the storage pool Usage

– Database Environments - Create separate domains for the logs and the data files for data protection and comfort

– Hosting – Allocate specific bricks to specific customers within the overall Axiom pool

– Private cloud – allow departmental charging for bricks– Overcome project based storage acquisition– Brick based data migration for brick upgrades

Extending QoS for Cloud EnvironmentsExtending QoS for Cloud Environments

Slammer acts as Cloud Controller Each domain has its own Bricks, Storage Classes and

RAID controllers Storage Domains act as separate application containers A separate storage domain can be created for every

Cloud user (application owner or external cloud customer in a hosting example)

Users can acquire additional bricks to be added to their own storage domain within the Cloud

Every Cloud user still has the benefits of Quality of Service and storage classes

A Customer ExampleA Customer Example

Supporting the NHSSupporting the NHS

UK’s leading supplier of IT to GPs

Store 39 million UK patient records

More than half of UK GPs use their

software

Written by doctors for doctors

Delivers Cloud services to the NHS

Delivering storage and shared access

of patient records

The Challenges FacedThe Challenges Faced

Existing system could not scale fast enough Tens of thousands of users would be accessing

the system Huge growth with the system likely to grow to 15

times that of the original Needed a predictable cost model as they scaled Needed to feel comfortable around performance

SLAs with growth

The Solution DeployedThe Solution Deployed

Systems Deployed– 6 x Tri Slammer Axiom 600s for production operations– 1 Axiom 600 for test and development– 1 Axiom 500 for offsite development

Applications Serviced– In-house– PCS– EMIS Web– VMware ESX (migrating to VSphere 4.0)– Microsoft SQL Server– Symantec NetBackup– Virtual Tape Library

The BenefitsThe Benefits

High scalability of performance and scalability to address rapid growth

Predictable pricing model Adaptability to address the differing business

needs of multiple applications High utilisation and efficiency to deliver

maximum value for money to customers

Building Your CloudBuilding Your Cloud

And FinallyAnd Finally

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