Storage does not mean Capacity only

I was listening to several storage luminaries in the GestaltIT’s podcastNo one understands Storage anymore” a few of weeks ago. Around the minute of 11.09 in the podcast, Dr. J. Metz, SNIA® Chair, brought up this is powerful quote “Storage does not mean Capacity“. It struck me, not in a funny way. It is what it is, and it something I wanted to say to many who do not understand the storage solutions they are purchasing. It exemplifies what is wrong in the many organizations today in their understanding of investing in a storage infrastructure project.

This is my pet peeve. The first words uttered in most, if not all storage requirements in my line of work are, “I want this many Terabytes of storage“. There are no other details and context of what the other requirement factors are, such as availability, performance, future growth, etc. Or even the goals to achieve when purchasing a storage system and operating it. What is the improvement they are looking for? What are the problems to solve?

Where is the OKR?

It pains me to say this. For the folks who have in the IT industry for years, both end users and IT purveyors alike, most are absolutely clueless about OKR (Objectives and Key Results) for their storage infrastructure project. Many cannot frame the data challenges they are facing, and they have no idea where to go next. There is no alignment. There is no strategy. Even worse, there is no concept of how their storage infrastructure investments will improve their business and operations.

Just the other day, one company director from a renown IT integrator here in Malaysia came calling. He has been in the IT industry since 1989 (I checked his Linkedin profile), asking to for a 100TB storage quote. I asked a few questions about availability, performance, scalability; the usual questions a regular IT guy would ask. He has no idea, and instead of telling me he didn’t know, he gave me a runaround of this and that. Plenty of yada, yada nonsense.

In the end, I told him to buy a consumer grade storage appliance from Taiwan. I will just let him make a fool of himself in front of his customer since he didn’t want to take accountability of ensuring his customer get a proper enterprise storage solution in good faith. His customer is probably in the same mould as well.

Defensive Strategies as Data Foundations

A strong storage infrastructure foundation is vital for good Data Credibility. If you do the right things for your data, there is Data Value, and it will serve your business well. Both Data Credibility and Data Value create confidence. And Confidence equates Trust.

In order to create the defensive strategies let’s look at storage Availability, Protection, Accessibility, Management Security and Compliance. These are 6 of the 8 data points of the A.P.P.A.R.M.S.C. framework.

Offensive Strategies as Competitive Advantage

Once we have achieved stability of the storage infrastructure foundation, then we can turn over and drive towards storage Performance, Recovery, plus things like Scalability and Agility.

With a strong data infrastructure foundation, the organization can embark on the offensive, and begin their business transformation journey, knowing that their data is well run, protection, and performs.

Alignment with Data and Business Goals

Why are the defensive and offensive strategies requiring alignment to business goals?

The fact is simple. It is about improving the business and operations, and setting OKRs is key to measure the ROI (return of investment) of getting the storage systems and the solutions in place. It is about switching the cost-fearing (negative) mindset to a profit-conviction (positive) mindset.

For example, maybe the availability of the data to the business is poor. Maybe there is the need to have access to the data 24×7, because the business is going online. The simple measurable fact is we can move availability from 95% uptime to 99.99% uptime with an HA storage system.

Perhaps there are concerns about recoverability in the deluge of ransomware threats. Setting new RPO goals from 24 hours to 4 hours is a measurable objective to enhance data resiliency.

Or getting the storage systems to deliver higher performance from 350 IOPS to 5000 IOPS for the database.

What I am saying here is these data points are measurable, and they can serve as checkpoints for business and operational improvements. From a management perspective, these can be used as KPI (key performance index) to define continuous improvement of Data Confidence.

Furthermore, it is easy when a OKR dashboard is used to map the improvement markers when organizations use storage to move from point A to point B, where B equates to a new success milestone. The alignment sets the paths to the business targets.

Storage does not mean only Capacity

The sad part is what the OKRs and the measured goals alignments are glaringly missing in the minds of many organizations purchasing a storage infrastructure and data management solution. The people tasked to source a storage technology solution are not placing a set of goals and objectives. Capacity appears to be the only thing on their mind.

I am about to meet a procurement officer of a customer soon. She asked me this question “Why is your storage so expensive?” over email. I want to change her mindset, just like the many officers and C-levels who hold the purse strings.

Let’s frame the use storage infrastructure in the real world. Nobody buys a storage system just to keep data in there much like a puddle keeps stagnant water. Sooner or later the value of the data in the storage evaporates or the value becomes dull if the data is not used well in any ways, shape or form.

Storage systems and the interconnected pathways from on premises, to the next premises, to the edge and to the clouds serve the greater good for Data. Data is used, shared, shaped, improved, enhanced, protected, moved, and more to deliver Value to the Business.

Storage capacity is just one of the few factors to consider when investing in a storage infrastructure solution. In fact, capacity is probably the least important piece when considering a storage solution to achieve the company’s OKRs. If we think about it deeper, setting the foundation for Data in the defensive manner will help elevate value of the data to be promoted with the offensive strategies to gain the competitive advantage.

Storage infrastructure and storage solutions along with data management platforms may appear to be a cost to the annual budgets. If you know set the OKRs, define A to get to B, alignment the goals, storage infrastructure and the data management platforms and practices are investments that are worth their weight in gold. That is my guarantee.

On the flip side, ignoring and avoiding OKRs, and set the strategies without prudence will yield its comeuppance. Technical debts will prevail.

Rant over.

Disaggregation and Composability vital for AI/DL models to scale

New generations of applications and workloads like AI/DL (Artificial Intelligence/Deep Learning), and HPC (High Performance Computing) are breaking the seams of entrenched storage infrastructure models and frameworks. We cannot continue to scale-up or scale-out the storage infrastructure to meet these inundating fluctuating I/O demands. It is time to look at another storage architecture type of infrastructure technology – Composable Infrastructure Architecture.

Infrastructure is changing. The previous staid infrastructure architecture parts of compute, network and storage have long been thrown of the window, precipitated by the rise of x86 server virtualization almost 20 years now. It triggered a tsunami of virtualizing everything, including storage virtualization, which eventually found a more current nomenclature – Software Defined Storage. Both storage virtualization and software defined storage (SDS) are similar and yet different and should be revered through different contexts and similar goals. This Tech Target article laid out both nicely.

As virtualization raged on, converged infrastructure (CI) which evolved into hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) went fever pitch for a while. Companies like Maxta, Pivot3, Atlantis, are pretty much gone, with HPE® Simplivity and Cisco® Hyperflex occasionally blipped in my radar. In a market that matured very fast, HCI is now dominated by Nutanix™ and VMware®, with smaller Microsoft®, Dell EMC® following them.

From HCI, the attention of virtualization has shifted something more granular, more scalable in containerization. Despite a degree of complexity, containerization is taking agility and scalability to the next level. Kubernetes, Dockers are now mainstay nomenclature of infrastructure engineers and DevOps. So what is driving composable infrastructure? Have we reached the end of virtualization? Not really.

Evolution of infrastructure. Source: IDC

It is just that one part of the infrastructure landscape is changing. This new generation of AI/ML workloads are flipping the coin to the other side of virtualization. As we see the diagram above, IDC brought this mindset change to get us to Think Composability, the next phase of Infrastructure.

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Understanding security practices in File Synchronization

Ho hum. Another day, and another data leak. What else is new?

The latest hullabaloo in my radar was from one of Malaysia’s reverent universities, UiTM, which reported a data leak of 11,891 student applicants’ private details including MyKad (national identity card) numbers of each individual. Reading from the news article, one can deduced that the unsecured link mentioned was probably from a cloud storage service, i.e. file synchronization software such as OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox, etc. Those files that can be easily shared via an HTTP/S URL link. Ah, convenience over the data security best practices. 

Cloud File Sync software

It irks me when data security practices are poorly practised. And it is likely that there is ignorance of data security practices in the first place.

It also irks me when many end users everywhere I have encountered tell me their file synchronization software is backup. That is just a very poor excuse of a data protection strategy, if any, especially in enterprise and cloud environments. Convenience, set-and-forget mentality. Out of sight. Out of mind. Right? 

Convenience is not data security. File Sync is NOT Backup

Many users are used to the convenience of file synchronization. The proliferation of cloud storage services with free Gigabytes here and there have created an IT segment based on BYOD, which transformed into EFSS, and now CCP. The buzzword salad involves the Bring-Your-Own-Device, which evolved into Enterprise-File-Sync-&-Share, and in these later years, Content-Collaboration-Platform.

All these are fine and good. The data industry is growing up, and many are leveraging the power of file synchronization technologies, be it on on-premises and from cloud storage services. Organizations, large and small, are able to use these file synchronization platforms to enhance their businesses and digitally transforming their operational efficiencies and practices. But what is sorely missing in embracing the convenience and simplicity is the much ignored cybersecurity housekeeping practices that should be keeping our files and data safe.

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Reverting the Cloud First mindset

When cloud computing was all the rage, every business wanted to be on-board. Those who resisted felt the heat as the FOMO (fear of missing out) feeling set in, especially those who were doing this thing called “Digital Transformation“. The public cloud service providers took advantage of the cloud computing frenzy, calling for a “Cloud First” strategy. For a number of years, the marketing worked. The cloud first mentality became the tip of the tongue of many, encouraging droves to cloud adoption.

All this was fine and dandy but recently, we are beginning to hear and read about a few high profile cases of cloud repatriation. DHH‘s journal of Basecamp’s exit from AWS in late 2022 reverberated strongly, saying what should be a wake up call for those caught in the Cloud Computing Hotel California’s gilded cage. An even more bizarre claim about cost savings of $400 million over 3 years was made by Ahrefs, a Singapore SEO software maker which chose to use a co-location facility instead of a public cloud service.

Cloud First is not Cool (not sure where is the source is from but I got this off Twitter some months ago)

While these big news jail breaks are going against the grain, most are still in that diaspora to jump into the cloud services everywhere. In droves even. But, on and off, I am beginning to hear some grips, grunts and groans from end users in the cloud. These news have emboldened some to think that there is another choice besides shifting all IT and data services to the cloud.

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Project COSI

The S3 (Simple Storage Service) has become a de facto standard for accessing object storage. Many vendors claim 100% compatibility to S3, but from what I know, several file storage services integration and validation with the S3 have revealed otherwise. There are certain nuances that have derailed some of the more advanced integrations. I shall not reveal the ones that I know of, but let us use this thought as a basis of our discussion for Project COSI in this blog.

Project COSI high level architecture

What is Project COSI?

COSI stands for Container Object Storage Interface. It is still an alpha stage project in Kubernetes version 1.25 as of September 2022 whilst the latest version of Kubernetes today is version 1.26. To understand the objectives COSI, one must understand the journey and the challenges of persistent storage for containers and Kubernetes.

For me at least, there have been arduous arguments of provisioning a storage repository that keeps the data persistent (and permanent) after containers in a Kubernetes pod have stopped, or replicated to another cluster. And for now, many storage vendors in the industry have settled with the CSI (container storage interface) framework when it comes to data persistence using file-based and block-based storage. You can find a long list of CSI drivers here.

However, you would think that since object storage is the most native storage to containers and Kubernetes pods, there is already a consistent way to accessing object storage services. From the objectives set out by Project COSI, turns out that there isn’t a standard way to provision and accessing object storage as compared to the CSI framework for file-based and block-based storage. So the COSI objectives were set to:

  • Kubernetes Native – Use the Kubernetes API to provision, configure and manage buckets
  • Self Service – A clear delineation between administration and operations (DevOps) to enable self-service capability for DevOps personnel
  • Portability – Vendor neutrality enabled through portability across Kubernetes Clusters and across Object Storage vendors

Further details describing Project COSI can be found here at the Kubernetes site titled “Introducing COSI: Object Storage Management using Kubernetes API“.

Standardization equals technology adoption

Standardization means consistency, control, confidence. The higher the standardization across the storage and containerized apps industry, the higher the adoption of the technology. And given what I have heard from the industry over these few years, Kubernetes, to me, even till this day, is a platform and a framework that are filled and riddled with so many moving parts. Many of the components looks the same, feels the same, and sounds the same, but might not work out the same when deployed.

Therefore, the COSI standardization work is important and critical to grow this burgeoning segment, especially when we are rocketing towards disaggregation of computing service units, resources that be orchestrated to scale up or down at the execution of codes. Infrastructure-as-Code (IAC) is becoming a reality more and more with each passing day, and object storage is at the heart of this transformation for Kubernetes and containers.

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Open Source on my mind

Last week was cropped with topics around Open Source software. I want to voice my opinions here (with a bit of ranting) and hoping not to rouse many abhorrent comments from different parties and views. This blog is to create conversations, even controversial ones, but we must first agree that there will be disagreements. We must accept disagreements as part of this conversation.

In my 30 years career, Open Source has been a big part of my development and progress. The ideas of freely using (certain) software without any licensing implications and these software being openly available were not always welcomed, as they are now. I think the Open Source revolution has created an innovation movement that is still going strong, and it has not only permeated completely into the IT industry, Open Source has also now in almost every part of the technology-based industries as well. The Open Source influence is massive.

Open Source word cloud

In the beginning

In the beginning, in my beginning in 1992, the availability of software and its source codes was a closed one. Coming from a VAX/VMS background (I was a system admin in my mathematics department’s mini computers), Unix liberated my thinking. The final 6 months in the university was systems programming in C, and it completely changed how I wanted my career to shape. The mantra of “Free as in Freedom” in General Public License GPL (which I got know of much later) boded well with my own tenets in life.

If closed source development models led to proprietary software and a centralized way to distributing software with license, I would count the Open Source development models as one of the earliest decentralized technology frameworks. Down with the capitalistic corporations (aka Evil Empires)!

It was certainly a wonderful and generous way to make the world that it is today. It is a better world now.

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Beyond the WORM with MinIO object storage

I find the terminology of WORM (Write Once Read Many) coming back into the IT speak in recent years. In the era of rip and burn, WORM was a natural thing where many of us “youngsters” used to copy files to a blank CD or DVD. I got know about how WORM worked when I learned that the laser in the CD burning process alters the chemical compound in a segment on the plastic disc of the CD, rendering the “burned” segment unwritable once it was written but it could be read many times.

At the enterprise level, I got to know about WORM while working with tape drives and tape libraries in the mid-90s. The objective of WORM is to save and archive the data and files in a non-rewritable format for compliance reasons. And it was the data compliance and data protection parts that got me interested into data management. WORM is a big deal in many heavily regulated industries such as finance and banking, insurance, oil and gas, transportation and more.

Obviously things have changed. WORM, while very much alive in the ageless tape industry, has another up-and-coming medium in Object Storage. The new generation of data infrastructure and data management specialists are starting to take notice.

Worm Storage – Image from Hubstor (https://www.hubstor.net/blog/write-read-many-worm-compliant-storage/)

I take this opportunity to take MinIO object storage for a spin in creating WORM buckets which can be easily architected as data compliance repositories with many applications across regulated industries. Here are some relevant steps.

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Truthful information under attack. The call for Data Preservation

The slogan of The Washington Post is “Democracy Dies in Darkness“. Although not everyone agrees with the US brand of democracy, the altruism of WaPo‘s (the publication’s informal name) slogan is a powerful one. The venerable newspaper remains the beacon in the US as one of the most trustworthy sources of truthful, honest information.

4 Horsemen of Apocalypse with the 5th joining

Misinformation

Misinformation has become a clear and present danger to humanity. Fake news, misleading information, lies are fueling and propelling the propaganda and agenda of the powerful (and the deranged). Facts are blurred, obfuscated, and even removed and replaced with misinformation to push for the undesirable effects that will affect the present and future generations.

The work of SNIA®

Data preservation is part of Data Management. More than a decade ago, SNIA® has already set up a technical work group (TWG) on Long Term Retention and proposed a format for long-term storage of digital format. It was called SIRF (Self-contained Information Retention Format). In the words of SNIA®, “The SIRF format enables long-term physical storage, cloud storage and tape-based containers effective and efficient ways to preserve and secure digital information for many decades, even with the ever-changing technology landscape.”

I don’t think battling misinformation was SNIA®’s original intent, but the requirements for a vendor-neutral organization as such to present and promote long term data preservation is more needed than ever. The need to protect the truth is paramount.

SNIA® continues to work with many organizations to create and grow the ecosystem for long term information retention and data preservation.

NFTs can save data

Despite the hullabaloo of NFTs (non-fungible tokens), which is very much soiled and discredited by the present day cryptocurrency speculations, I view data (and metadata) preservation as a strong use case for NFTs. The action is to digitalize data into an NFT asset.

Here are a few arguments:

  1. NFTs are unique. Once they are verified and inserted into the blockchain, they are immutable. They cannot be modified, and each blockchain transaction is created with one never to be replicated hashed value.
  2. NFTs are decentralized. Most of the NFTs we know of today are minted via a decentralized process. This means that the powerful cannot (most of the time), effect the NFTs state according to its whims and fancies. Unless the perpetrators know how to manipulate a Sybil attack on the blockchain.
  3. NFTs are secure. I have to set the knowledge that NFTs in itself is mostly very secure. Most of the high profiled incidents related to NFTs are more of internal authentication vulnerabilities and phishing related to poor security housekeeping and hygiene of the participants.
  4. NFTs represent authenticity. The digital certification of the NFTs as a data asset also define the ownership and the originality as well. The record of provenance is present and accounted for.

Since NFTs started as a technology to prove the assets and artifacts of the creative industry, there are already a few organizations that playing the role. Orygin Art is one that I found intriguing. Museums are also beginning to explore the potential of NFTs including validating and verifying the origins of many historical artifacts, and digitizing these physical assets to preserve its value forever.

The technology behind NFTs are not without its weaknesses as well but knowing what we know today, the potential is evident and power of the technology has yet to be explored fully. It does present a strong case in preserving the integrity of truthful data, and the data as historical artifacts.

Protect data safety and data integrity

Misinformation is damaging. Regardless if we believe the Butterfly Effect or not, misinformation can cause a ripple effect that could turn into a tidal wave. We need to uphold the sanctity of Truth, and continue to protect data safety and data integrity. The world is already damaged, and it will be damaged even more if we allow misinformation to permeate into the fabric of the global societies. We may welcome to a dystopian future, unfortunately.

This blog hopes to shake up the nonchalant state that we view “information” and “misinformation” today. There is a famous quote that said “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth“. We must lead the call to combat misinformation. What we do now will shape the generations of our present and future. Preserve Truth.

WaPo “Democracy Dies in Darkness”

[ Condolence: Japan Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, was assassinated last week. News sources mentioned that the man who killed him had information that the slain PM has ties to a religious group that bankrupted his mother. Misinformation may played a role in the killing of the Japanese leader. ]

Is denying public cloud storage a storm in a political teacup or something more?

Ah, India! The country that gave us the Silicon Valley of Asia in Bengaluru, and exports over USD$150 billion software and IT services to the world.

Last week, the government of India banned the use of non-sanctioned public cloud storage such as Google® Drive and Dropbox®, plus the use of VPNs (virtual private networks). This is nothing new as China has banned foreign VPN services, Dropbox®, for years while Google® was adjusting its plans for China in 2020, with little hope to do more it is allowed to. I am not sure what the India’s alternatives are but China already has their own cloud storage services for a while now. So, what does this all mean?

India bans public cloud storage and VPN services

Public cloud storage services has been a boon for over a decade since Dropbox® entered the scene in 2008. BYOD (bring your own devices) became a constant in every IT person’s lips at that time. And with the teaser of 2GB or more, many still rely on these public cloud storage services with the ability to sync with tablets, smart phones and laptops. But the proliferation of these services also propagated many cybersecurity risks, and yes, ransomware can infect these public cloud storage. Even more noxious, the synchronization of files and folders of these services with on-premises storage devices makes it easy for infected data to spread, often with great efficacy.

Banning these widely available cloud storage applications is more than an inconvenience. Governments like China and India are shoring up their battlegrounds, as the battle for the protection and the privacy of sovereign data will not only escalate but also create a domino effect in the geopolitical dominance in the digital landscape.

We have already seen news that India is asserting its stance against China. First there was an app called “Remove China App” that came up in Google® Play Store in 2020. Also in 2020, the Ministry of Information Technology of India also banned 59 apps, mostly from China in order to protect the “sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order”.

This is not the war of 2 of the most populous nations of the world. Underneath these acts, there are more things to come, and it won’t just involve China and India. We will see other nations follow, with some already in the works to draw boundaries and demarcate digital borders in the name of data security, privacy, sovereignty and protection.

I hear of some foreign vendors lamenting about such a move. Most have already either complied with China’s laws or chose to exit that market. This recent move by India may feel like a storm in a teacup, but beneath it all, the undercurrent is getting stronger each day. A digital geopolitical tempest is percolating and brewing.