Storage Architectures with LDVM: Faster, Less ComPlex

While attending the VMware TechSummit this week, someone asked why I thought storage was relevant in light of server virtualization, the virtual datacenter, cloud deployments, the software mainframe, etc…

OK - This individual didn’t actual say software mainframe but I though I'd inject it into their synonym roll call. Mmmm… Synonym Rolls. Sounds yummy! (OK - running on 4 hours of sleep may be impacting my sense of humor).

In response to this question I replied, “There is one thing I can guarantee, which is by the time I finish this statement your company will have generated and stored more data than when I began.”

Consider the similarities with, and the diametrically opposed aspects of, the adoption rate of server virtualization and the data growth rate in your data center.

• Server virtualization separates the compute layer from the physical layer resulting in a means to enable application mobility
  
  
• Data growth is rampant, commonly growing at 50-100% year over year. A single copy is a minimum, redundant copies aren't free, and replication requires more bandwidth each year. These force work to keep data sedentary in nature

So why do I, like most of the engineers at NetApp, find the storage aspect of data center virtualization interesting? Simple, it's because we are developing ways to make application mobility a reality by addressing the shackles restricting data to an individual datacenter.