It's not going to be this easy to bridge Fibre Channel and Ethernet!

Before the holidays, I posed a question on Google+ that generated quite a bit of interest and feedback. Now that it has settled down a bit I’d like to summarize the unresolved elements to make FCoE truly a world-class storage interconnect.

Setting the Stage

FCoE has been a controversial topic in both storage and networking, and for good reason. No one would deny that Ethernet is not an ideal transport mechanism for block storage I/O. “Porting” Fibre Channel to run on Ethernet networks has been a supreme technical challenge, and many companies and individuals have labored long and hard to make FCoE a reality.

Now that FCoE is specified in the standard and has been deployed in production environments, the question turns to its future. Will it take off and seize the mantle of dominance currently held by what I like retroactively to call “Fibre Channel over Fibre Channel?” Will they coexist for the next decade, with FCoE mainly deployed in “block” environments such as Cisco UCS? Or will FCoE ultimately fail to catch on, displaced by some other storage protocol like plain FC, iSCSI, NFS, or something entirely different?

The data center needs a flexible new protocol to meet the needs of virtual environments, and convergence of storage and data networking makes a great deal of sense in these environments. This was the root of my question, and I ask it in all earnestness.

My question: What elements remain unresolved to make FCoE truly world-class? What should the vendors be prioritizing? Here are the answers I received.

Technical Considerations

Link Aggregation on CNA’s

Converged network adapters (CNA’s) allow multiple protocols to access a single Ethernet connection, but some also include multiple ports that can be aggregated. In traditional Ethernet networks, link aggregation is a respectable approach for performance and availability. But storage networks have traditionally relied on host-based MPIO software, and these features are mutually exclusive. The zeitgeist seems to be a recommendation to avoid link aggregation on CNA’s that are used for storage networks.

How Do You Handle Virtual Machine Mobility?

As I described recently, virtual machine mobility is a major technical challenge for existing networks. The VMware proposal, the VXLAN, seems to be gaining traction right now. But this is only a solution for data networking. How will FCoE SANs handle virtual machine mobility? This remains unresolved as far as I can tell, though Ethernet switch vendors have come up with their own answers. Brocade demonstrated just such a solution at Networking Field Day 2, and I know that others have answers as well. But will there be an interoperable industry solution?

How Should FCoE Be Implemented Over Longer Distances?

Fibre Channel has traditionally relied on routers and other protocols (FCIP and iFCP) to span distances, but FCoE raises the possibility of native traversal. While it is certainly possible to span distances with FCoE, this is definitely not a recommended or supported idea. Without TCP/IP, or any routing mechanism, it’s just a bad idea. But I imagine that it won’t be long before vendors decide to give it a go anyway.

Implementation Considerations

Is TRILL Required for FCoE Networks?

This has been one of my own questions since the very beginning. Clearly, edge only FCoE works just fine without TRILL. But as networks become more complicated, and virtual machines move, it seems an awfully good idea to have some protocol to alleviate East-West routing concerns. I feel much better with TRILL (or some similar Ethernet fabric technology) in a complicated FCoE network.

Should All Switches Be Full FC Forwarders?

There are number of ways to implement FCoE on Ethernet network, and not all involve building a full Fibre Channel stack in each switch. While many (including myself) assumed that FCoE implied Fibre Channel forwarding in all switches, this is clearly not the direction taken by vendors, at least initially. Perhaps the current “Ethernet forwarding” approach is only a stepping stone, or perhaps it will emerge as the dominant FCoE standard.

How Will OpenFCoE and LoM Be Used?

OpenFCoE is a software solution allowing FCoE to be run without a CNA. If this became popular, it wouldn’t be long before data center architects began looking at LAN on Motherboard (LoM) and even 10GBASE-T as a potential SAN alternative. Will this be used in the long run? It could happen, but it’s certainly not something that’s here at the moment. But OpenFCoE is a real player, especially with Intel’s backing.

How Will Technologies like Zoning Interoperate?

Many networkers are just now beginning to see the true complexity of Fibre Channel SANs. Although interoperability of higher-level Fibre Channel functions between vendors has never been a priority in “FC over FC” SANs, Ethernet could change things. I would not be at all surprised to see a groundswell of customer support demanding greater levels of interoperability from FCoE than from FC, and zoning and VSAN is the likely first beachhead.

The Big Question: When Will We See the “Killer App” For FCoE

Just about everyone agreed that the real challenge for FCoE is market acceptance. Customers aren’t yet demanding FCoE, and vendors are finding it hard to articulate a compelling case to move from “tried-and-true” FC. Convergence, cost savings, and performance have all been put forth, but customers aren’t biting. Perhaps they just need a little time and a little more proof.

This post relies extensively on feedback from a number of people, including Ivan Pepelnjak, Tony Bourke, J Metz, Dmitri Kalintsev, Derick Winkworth, David Hardaker, Juan Lage, and Corey Hines.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2012. |
Eight Unresolved Questions About FCoE


This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Everything, Gestalt IT, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you’d like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

© Stephen Foskett for Gestalt IT, 2012. | Eight Unresolved Questions About FCoE
Read more posts categorized as Storage

So we rounded up Ivan from IOS Hints and Greg from EtherealMind to record a fast, furious and focussed look at the state of play with the three data centre fabrics today. Lots of speculation, wild guesses and deep diving followed. I learned heaps.

Topics that we covered: * data centre fabric design, TRILL, Borg or Big Brother approaches, * FCoE, iSCSI, NFS, Routing, * Juniper, QFX 3500, QFabric, ERX, ICN, * Brocade, VDX, VCS, FSPF, * Cisco, Nexus 7000, Nexus 5000,

Name: Ivan Pepelnjak

Web: http://blog.ioshints.net Twitter: @ioshints

Name: Kurt Bales

Web: www.network-janitor.net Twitter: @networkjanitor

Name: Greg Ferro

Web: www.etherealmind.comTwitter: @etherealmind

Links and Posts

This post is where Ivan looks into TRILL and STP interaction at the edge of the L2 network. IOSHints TRILL/FABRIC PATH – STP INTEGRATION

Here is the post where Ivan outlines the Borg / Big Brother architectures. THE DATA CENTER FABRIC ARCHITECTURES

Brad Hedlund’s post on  Inverse Virtualisation – it seems Cisco might be forgetting that  there is more than one way to do it and Brad talks about the the other ways to do it while pointing out that the way HE does it is best. Keep up the good work Brad and stay “on message” for Cisco – keep pulling for the team.

Greg’s post at EtherealMind.com on Controller based networks and might be worth contrasting with the move away from controller based networks in wireless AeroHive, HP, ‘Big Boner’ AP’s and Wireless LAN Controllers

Feedback

Follow the Packet Pushers on Twitter (@packetpushers | Greg @etherealmind | Tom Hollingsworth), and send your queries & comments about the show to packetpushers@gmail.com.  We want to hear from you!

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Media Player and MP3 Download

You can subscribe to the RSS feed or head over to the Packet Pushers website to download the MP3 file directly from the blog post for that episode.

© Etherealmind for Gestalt IT, 2011. | Show 38 – Comparing Data Centre Fabrics From Juniper, Brocade and Cisco
Read more posts categorized as Favorites, Networking

The players are lining up for the biggest acquisition game enterprise IT has witnessed in a while

Today is the (a?) day of reckoning in the 3Par saga, with Dell widely expected to make a counter-offer higher than HP’s bid. But this mega deal, like the Data Domain war before it, sends a strong signal to the enterprise IT world: It’s open season on data storage companies! But the rising superpowers are also likely looking at networking as an area of expansion. The game is afoot!

The Competitors

The simple fact is, enterprise IT prefers to buy from large, established names like HP and IBM rather than smaller and less-familiar companies with names like Ocarina, EqualLogic, or even 3Par. The acceleration of sales by enterprise providers is what makes these big acquisitions so successful and why others involving less-powerful players often fail to deliver the same results.

Full-line “superpowers” like IBM, HP and now Dell and the new Oracle can influence purchasing decisions across a broad spectrum of hardware and software. Many large organizations are tightly coupled to one of these vendors, and will give their products stronger consideration even when they are new or unfamiliar. HP is already flexing their muscle selling their broadened network lineup, and Dell found that it could do this in data storage.

Software vendors like Microsoft, Citrix, and Oracle adamantly maintained a neutral stance toward hardware, but Ellison and company seem serious about changing this. Oracle’s success in selling Sun hardware will likely dictate further software acquisitions for Dell and HP, though IBM already has strength there. Then there is Intel, the wild card who just got wilder with their acquisition of McAfee.

Companies with narrower focus like Cisco, EMC, NetApp, Juniper, and Brocade have the same power within their sphere of influence but cannot pull in wholly-distinct products. Cisco is in the midst of this fight with their technically-excellent UCS blade servers: Although they were certainly a strategic CIO-level vendor in the largest organizations, “blades from a networking company” isn’t the as easy a decision as “networking gear from a full-line company.”

The Game

Then one must consider the market in contention. The enterprise IT space is not expanding, especially in the United States. This is very close to a zero-sum game, with Oracle’s or Dell’s wins being HP’s or IBM’s losses and vice-versa. There is massive money in play, and flexibility enough for it to swing between the competitors, but growth is not unlimited.

Enterprise storage and data center and campus networking are two areas where smaller companies retain enviably-large slices of the pie, explaining the interest in these spaces among the superpowers. These verticals still have room for sales to grow without displacing a fierce full-line foe, and the superpowers have lately been weak here. Storage and networking are enticing opportunities, but each slice is similarly dominated by “vertical superpowers” and partners EMC and Cisco.

So this is the game: Four full-line enterprise superpowers battling each other for datacenter dominance and coveting the extra profits of a few verticals. HP clearly believes they can chip away at EMC and Cisco in storage and networking; Dell and IBM have so far focused mainly on storage; and Oracle hasn’t made a move in either direction, instead challenging the other three in the core server and software space.

Pawns or Knights?

So where does this leave the smaller players? Are they merely pawns in the game, waiting to be sacrificed, or are they knights who can wield power across the field? The largest (Cisco and EMC especially) appear to have ambitions of their own as well as the financial and technical strength to shake up the game. They are unlikely to be acquired by the superpowers. Brocade, too, has broad strength in storage and networking but maintains relationships across the board that make an acquisition difficult.

Strong vertical players like Juniper, NetApp, Riverbed, and Compellent are ripe for acquisition, as were Foundry, 3Com, Data Domain, and 3Par. IBM, Dell, and Oracle are all likely buyers of the networking players, though HP may consider filling in where 3Com was found lacking. All four will likely take a strong look at the remaining storage players as well, with the loser in the battle for 3Par likely to be hungry indeed.

One should also consider the potential impact of smaller acquisitions. Although they would not immediately “move the needle” for a massive superpower, there are many excellent technology companies that could be bought low and pushed strongly. The enterprise-class technology at Sepaton, Pillar Data, Xiotech, BlueArc, Extreme Networks, Force10, Blue Coat, Isilon, CommVault, FalconStor, and many others should not be overlooked. If a superpower can drive a larger acquisition to succeed, imagine what they can do with strong but inexpensive technology from one of these!

Stephen’s Stance

This game is nowhere near finished. The 3Par acquisition will not only generate revenue, it will shake up the ranking of data storage array dominance. This is very likely to kick off additional acquisition in the data storage space, spurring either Dell or HP to pick up additional technology and perhaps causing IBM or Oracle to engage as well. With no easy alternatives to 3Par, I expect Compellent, Xiotech, and Pillar to get closer looks, but Sepaton and BlueArc are just as ripe. NetApp may be too expensive at this point, but would be a nice match for Oracle’s strategy.

HP’s acquisition of 3Com could also signal a race to integrate datacenter and campus networking technology into the stack. Many are suggesting a Brocade acquisition, and it would be much cheaper than Juniper, but OEM ties make it a difficult purchase for any of the superpowers. Extreme and Force10 would be excellent and less-expensive alternatives.

We should also keep our eyes outside the superpower space. Intel showed that they can make big moves, and Microsoft might consider a diversification into hardware as well. One should also look to the East, where Huawei could try to enter the Western market with a merger or joint-venture to cast off the China stigma. Although I would love to see a rebel alliance rise (imagine Juniper, NetApp, and Symantec joining forces!) this is not a likely scenario.

Image credit: Chess Board by mosdave

© Stephen Foskett for Gestalt IT, 2010. | The Enterprise IT Acquisition Game
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Who will power the enterprise? The smart money is betting on a few superpowers taking over.

After years spent focusing on personal technology, businesses are increasingly turning back to the enterprise. There are many reasons for this, but the biggest one is the poor economy. Individuals simply have less free cash to spend on gadgets and software, and the meagre profits are increasingly going into the pockets of a single company: Apple.

The corporate IT market is much more dynamic and competitive, with a few very large “superpower” companies discovering their power to drive purchasing decisions. If a supplier can create an integrated “stack” of hardware and software, they can push product purchases that might otherwise be overlooked or postponed. This is the main reason that enterprise IT acquisitions work so well: Where a small company must fight to sell their product, a large one can hitch it to a much more strategic sale and have it pulled along.

The old IBM model is the prototype, with that company once selling everything from office equipment to datacenter gear as well as the consulting and integration services to make it all work.

HP has spent almost two decades bulking up to become the new IBM, buying their way into open systems laptops, desktops, and servers (Compaq), networking (3Com), services (EDS), and storage (Compaq, LeftHand, Ibrix, and perhaps 3Par). HP has been remarkably proficient at executing on this enterprise plan: In talking to enterprise IT folks, I often hear IBM-esque sentiments regarding the new HP. They tell me they’re willing to give HP the benefit of the doubt when it comes to new technologies and products, buying on basis of the company’s reputation and ability to make everything work. This bodes well for the company’s post-Hurd future, and HP has the most-complete “enterprise stack” in the business.

But HP has a target on its back, pinned there by Dell. The folks from Round Rock believe they can be more efficient (and thus profitable) than HP in the same markets, and have been making moves to fortify their enterprise offerings. Dell was always more of a manufacturing than R&D business, but they have shown a desire to broaden their focus. Intrigued by the high-margin mid-enterprise storage business built from their EqualLogic acquisition and their success selling EMC storage, Dell is moving into the enterprise. They matched HP/EDS by purchasing Perot and have made smaller buys in storage (Ocarina, Exanet) as well as the big move for 3Par.

The next big emerging stack player is Oracle. The acquisition of Sun gave Oracle a strong hardware base to complement their command of enterprise software, and many expect further acquisitions. But Oracle is playing a different game than HP and Dell, focusing on the high-margin enterprise space and ignoring more competitive outlying areas. Many suspect the company might make a play in the network space (Brocade, Juniper, and F5 have been mentioned) but storage is possible as well. CEO Larry Ellison is a major investor in Pillar Data Systems, so many expect a spin-in here. But Oracle has the appetite for something much bigger, even EMC or NetApp.

Then there is Cisco, who have attempted to parlay their data center networking strength into a broader position. But Cisco’s halting moves into storage (Fibre Channel switching and SAN extension) did not displace the market leaders, and their server products (UCS) have not made much of a dent on HP, IBM, and Dell either. A solid partnership with EMC has delayed further forays into the enterprise storage market, and Cisco seems puzzlingly interested in low-margin access businesses (Linksys, Flip) and their Cius tablet.

There are other players in the enterprise space as well. EMC has diversified under CEO Joe Tucci, taking a dominant position in server virtualization (VMware) and making a strong enterprise security acquisition (RSA). But the many faces of enterprise storage remains EMC’s strength, and they seem content to partner with Cisco for a stack sale. Hitachi, NEC, and Fujitsu also offer varying enterprise hardware and software stacks, but their comparatively small sales presence in the US market limits their ability to execute. In the final analysis, only IBM, HP, Dell, and perhaps Oracle can claim to be enterprise IT superpowers at this point.

Image credit: Steam Engine by Stuck in Customs

© Stephen Foskett for Gestalt IT, 2010. | Meet the Enterprise IT Superpowers
Read more posts categorized as Featured, Networking, Server Virtualization, Storage

• The rumors are flying that Brocade is up for sale.  We theorize about who might want to buy them and why, clearly demonstrating why we’re network engineers and not stock analysts.
• Cisco has attached its name to the Linksys brand, so what does that mean for Cisco’s image when Linksys routers are hackable?  We have a fascinating deep dive on this topic, until Greg’s head explodes with boredom and he rips the mic from our hands.
• Check Point Heavy Industries has announced astonishing sales and profits for Q2 2010.  We scratch our heads as to why.  Are there any engineers out there still showing Check Point the love?  The Pushers sure aren’t…
• In round #2 of our musings on career development, we talk about whether you really need to turn to the dark side to keep going onward and upward.  Are managers people too?  We think it’s possible, but we’re not convinced.
• When designing data center redundancy, how does an architect draw the line between appropriate and overkill?  Is dual-everything just lining your vendor’s pockets?  Can the complexity of a high availability configuration actually introduce MORE risk to your data center, rather than less?  We have a lively discussion and try to define “money well spent”.

Follow the Packet Pushers on Twitter (@packetpushers | @etherealmind | @danhughes1234ie | @ecbanks) and send your queries and comments about the show to packetpushers@gmail.com.  We want to hear from you!

© Etherealmind for Gestalt IT, 2010. | Show 13 – Turning to the Dark Side
Read more posts categorized as Favorites, Networking

Brocade paid $3.4 billion for Foundry and rushed the acquisition using a lot of cash to close the deal quickly. HP just completed the 3Com purchase for $2.7 billion. To my mind, the 3Com assets are a lot more valuable since they also have firewalls, IDS and a wide range of networking products. Foundry only has Core Ethernet switching products and no access ethernet, no service provider, no wireless.

Of course, Brocade only makes high end FibreChannel switches which are high performance, high complexity and highly proprietary so Foundry makes a nice fit to nice little corner of the market for a tidy profit. But when Cisco announced FCoE and then threw a billion dollars behind it, Brocade’s core products around FibreChannel became obsolete. Oh, I know the FibreChannel will limp along for a few more years, but there is no five year plan for growth anymore. That’s over. Ethernet is the future.

And the Data Centre has become a war zone between HP, IBM, Cisco and now HDS. Where does Brocade fit in?

Foundry Command Line is a mess

I have also worked on the Foundry Ethernet equipment and find it a confusing mess of interface, syntax and technology differences. It needs a lot of support to keep that equipment running. As a result, it’s hard to like and use the Foundry / Brocade ethernet story. I recently worked on a site that has ServerIron, FastIron and BigIron switches. Each one has a slight, but significant difference in CLI that makes them frustrating to work with (and appreciate how Cisco’s IOS interface is reasonably consistent). I had to constantly refer to the manuals to validate and cross reference every command. That’s a but annoying.

The EtherealMind View

Mistake

So I reckon Brocade made a big mistake buying Foundry at all, and certainly overpaid for what they did get. Brocade’s share price has dropped a long way, and there has been VERY little information about what they are doing with their Ethernet products. They don’t share anything about future plans or get involved with customers from what I can see.

Where’s the plan?

I’m not a Brocade customer, and unlikely to ever consider them until I know more about what they are doing. And that doesn’t mean meeting with a sales team or marketing team. I should be able to clearly perceive the future from their public presence. I don’t want closed briefings or NDA roadmaps. Just show me a coherent plan, on your website, and then I can consider you as a serious supplier.

Or is it just me? Can you see a future for Brocade beyond five years?

© Etherealmind for Gestalt IT, 2010. | Brocade – What’s Their Direction?
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Update: As of October EMC has officially revealed the Atmos Online Compute Service, and it is as we suggested back in August.

EMC is a storage company, right? Not anymore! Under Joe Tucci, the disk giant from Hopkinton has been diversifying rapidly, with acquisitions like VMware, Documentum, RSA, and Smarts. But is the IT world ready for EMC’s next move? Is EMC itself ready?

EMC introduced Atmos, their platform for private and public cloud storage, in November. Now they are expanding this solution to include virtual servers as well, with Atmos becoming a complete package service providers can use to compete with Amazon’s EC2 and S3. This product introduction is EMC’s first foray into the server market, marking a major departure for the company. Will Atmos prove to be a minor addition to EMC’s portfolio or a step too far for the company and its partners?

Ben Linus on ABC's Lost found out what happens when the rules change. Will the introduction of EMC compute servers leave the company or its partners in shock?

The Atmos Problem

EMC launched the Atmos and Atmos onLine storage products in November of 2008 with a marketing splash. Many observers were puzzled at the time, trying to figure out how Atmos fit with VMware, Centera, and the storage products in the company’s product portfolio. One thing is clear: Atmos is not just another storage product line for EMC.

So what exactly is Atmos? Technically speaking, Atmos is a software product that transforms commodity servers and JBOD disk into an API-driven cloud storage platform. The Atmos offering leverages Dell servers, Gigabit Ethernet switches, and SAS disk shelves, but the hardware isn’t really an important element.

It is the business of Atmos that challenges our expectations of EMC the most. EMC still relies on storage sales for 80% of its revenue, yet Atmos presents a real challenge to that massive revenue stream. Although EMC has been careful to differentiate it from Celerra and Centera, Atmos can certainly be used in their place. Word is that Atmos has already replaced Celerra for basic bulk storage at a major EMC customer. And Atmos will soon also be out of beta as a true public pay-as-you-go service, Atmos onLine, both from partners like AT&T and from EMC itself.

EMC is in the cloud storage business and is actively seeking to expand this presence through private cloud and service provider relationships. This is a bold move for EMC, and it contrasts with their competitors’ timid “ammunition provider” cloud strategies. In the long run, the Atmos plan might be the salvation of the company, but it must be galling for the veteran EMC sales force.

The problem for EMC so far has been how to sell Atmos. These opportunities are said to be few and far between and focused only on the petabyte-scale solutions. The product was launched before there was a clear market in private cloud, and there simply are not many end-user customers who want to buy this sort of offering.

Introducing Atmos Compute?

Reviewers and commentators have long remarked that EMC’s storage base could be strengthened by adding additional capability, especially in the area of computing. We know EMC will be moving towards tighter compute/storage integration, but the company never before indicated that they will introduce their own compute platform. Now we know of two such compute products, and Atmos Compute Service is by far the most challenging for the company.

Widespread reports recently have talked of a joint VMware/Cisco/EMC datacenter product. This alliance even has a name: VCE. Enterprise Storage Forum quoted Linda Connly, EMC’s chief of staff and sales strategy, as saying ”we have been building an integrated ‘stack in a rack,’ which is essentially a virtual data center in one rack.” This seems to be a rack-scale integration of VMware ESX, Cisco UCS, and EMC storage, and was previewed at EMC World. The vPod (1.0) solution integrates EMC storage, Avamar, and ESX to provide backup service. Version 2 is in the works and is said to be a more-complete offering integrating Cisco UCS compute and 2950 switches and EMC V-Max with FCoE all tied up with Ionix/Smarts systems management. This VCE stack in a rack is a good, general-use roll-up of conventional solutions.

Now we hear that EMC is talking openly about launching its own cloud compute platform, called Atmos onLine Compute Service. Riki Fine of EMC’s Cloud Infrastructure Group presented an overview of EMC’s cloud infrastructure offerings last week at the Boston Cloud Services meetup. The presentation, posted at meetup.com, includes a slide (number 15, not marked as confidential) devoted to this Atmos onLine Compute Service, presented here:

It seems clear that this is a different product entirely from the Cisco-based vPod 2.0. We are presented with an integrated compute service similar to Amazon EC2 with persistent block storage like Amazon EBS. Looking closely, we see indications that VMware is used (as opposed to Amazon’s Xen-based EC2), which fits nicely with the vCloud concept presented at VMworld.

Since Atmos already uses commodity server hardware, EMC’s VMware ESX could easily be inserted to virtualize the stack, providing both storage and compute power. As a software product, Atmos (storage) could run within ESX on the same hardware alongside customer compute processes.

It looks like EMC has put together a compelling alternative to EC2:

• They (probably) use VMware ESX, which is more common and familiar than Xen. Atmos Compute Service might even be able to handle existing ESX instances migrated in from private servers!
• Atmos onLine storage supports NFS in addition to the Atmos API, unlike Amazon’s own S3 which is API-only.
• They offer VLANs for enhanced network security, which Amazon lacks lacked until the introduction of VPC.
• They seem to offer per-instance internal persistent IP addresses, another area of frustration for EC2 users.

In short, Atmos onLine Compute Service looks like a real Amazon EC2 challenger.

How Will Atmos Compute Be Sold?

One key question to be answered about Atmos onLine Compute Service is the go-to-market approach. The Boston slide deck places Compute in the “onLine” section, differentiating it from the Atmos products available directly to private/internal corporate users. We expect Atmos Compute to be initially rolled out by EMC itself as part of its Atmos beta program, with a major service provider following shortly.

Will AT&T sign up? They were the pilot customer for Atmos onLine storage, but Compute Service would seem competitive with AT&T’s own Synaptic Hosting offering. Perhaps one reason for the long gestation of this Atmos element is the lack of a partner or ISV for the launch? Given the VMware connection, we’ll be scanning the booths at VMworld in September.

The biggest weakness for Atmos storage thus far has been integration with third-party applications. EMC’s partnerships with application vendors are not strong at the moment, and certainly not in the spaces where API-driven Atmos storage might play. An application ecosystem is more likely to develop if EMC delivers its own Amazon EC2 and S3 competitor platform, especially if it is powered by a SpringSource-infused VMware.

It is extremely likely that Atmos Compute Service will be offered to enterprise customers building their own internal clouds. The cloud strategy of EMC and VMware presents a federated private/public cloud hybrid approach with applications and data moving between internal infrastructure and service providers with ease. This was one reason the company introduced Atmos as a storage platform: To seed their biggest enterprise customers with a cloud federation platform. Therefore, it seems very likely that EMC will soon be providing cloud compute servers to enterprise customers.

Changing the Rules

The availability of Atmos Compute to corporate IT customers places EMC in direct competition with HP, IBM, Dell, and even Cisco in the battle for server dollars.

Assuming it is not simply a branding of the VCE stack, Atmos Compute could be a game-changer for EMC. They already compete bitterly with HP and IBM for storage dollars, so entering their core server space poses little risk. Since it is based on Dell hardware, the suggested Atmos Compute product should not shake their long-term EMC partnership, and a Dell-branded version might even result.

It is the EMC/Cisco relationship that poses the biggest potential issue. Cisco has a history of game-changing product introductions, including their line of storage switches and the UCS server hardware. Cisco has remained willing to work with other storage vendors, announcing it selected NetApp for internal IT. Finally, rumors are flying that Cisco is preparing a storage array of their own for introduction next year.

Atmos Compute could be a response to this: A major rift could be forming in the EMC/Cisco alliance. Many have suggested that Cisco could buy EMC, but it seems more likely that EMC will try to become an integrated datacenter infrastructure provider, competing with Cisco, HP, and IBM.

Cisco is positioning UCS as the best platform upon which to run VMware for cloud/service provider environments due to its strong focus on multi-tenancy, RBAC, etc. Atmos Compute, coming from VMware’s own parent but on a different hardware platform, could be seen a direct competition. Perhaps Atmos Compute might be even more challenging for Cisco than the likes of HP and IBM, since it is positioned specifically for cloud environments.

This represents a major shift for the IT industry in general and the storage industry in particular. EMC has long been the standard-bearer for enterprise storage, but this move raises many questions:

• Does ownership of VMware give EMC a competitive advantage over the others?
• Since this move sounds like something Paul Maritz would come up with, does this make him the heir-apparent to Joe Tucci?
• Does this make a Dell/EMC or Cisco/EMC merger likely?
• Might a new wave of acquisitions result, with NetApp, Brocade, Citrix, and others scooped up and integrated?
• What does this assault by fully-integrated datacenter providers mean for the smaller storage, network, server, and virtualization vendors?
• Most importantly, how will customers react to EMC making a play for their server dollars?

We will be closely watching these developments!

In case you were wondering, EMC is not ready to comment on this product. The official EMC PR response follows:

“Today, EMC provides customers with the cost and flexibility benefits of cloud computing offered from the world’s leader in information infrastructure–building upon our expertise in information security (RSA), virtualization (VMware) and Cloud Infrastructure Services such as the recently introduced EMC Atmos onLine Storage Service. EMC doesn’t comment on futures or product roadmaps, but you can expect EMC to continue innovating to help customers maximize their information and virtual infrastructure IT environments.”

© Gestalt for Gestalt IT, 2009. | EMC Changes the Rules with Atmos Compute
Read more posts categorized as Cloud Computing, Exclusive, Featured, Networking, Server Virtualization, Storage, Top Story

The recent surge by storage networking vendors (Cisco and Brocade et al) to develop and roll out Ethernet based storage networks means that Storage and Networking teams are going to need to work together. The most common reaction from Storage professionals has been “I wouldn’t trust my storage data on the Data Network, I can’t rely on it!”.

Which is ridiculous and, ultimately, futile. As a Data Networking designer, I can assure you that is what the Voice Networking people said as the IP Telephony/VoIP technologies dismantled their careers. This isn’t any different.

FibreChannel is a single function network. Data Networks are multifunctional. And because of that, they are cheaper.

Why is Brocade walking away from FibreChannel ?

Brocade basically invented FibreChannel so that they could create a market that suited themselves very nicely. Which is fine because a number of other vendors joined in which validated the market that Brocade domainated.

But since Cisco bought the MDS its been clear that they were not going to settle for being number two and have been aggressively attacking the storage networking marketplace. Cisco knows that its strength is its existing customers and data networking, so the obvious progression is to move storage to the Data Network.

Enter FCoE………

Cisco picked a team of engineers and created a startup, Nuova Systems, with a brief to develop Ethernet Storage networking. They developed Fibre Channel over Ethernet and series of hardware products that had the silicon to support the requirements.

And they are serious requirements. The largest and most critical storage networks need low latency, low jitter and lossless network to ensure good operation. (Lets not talk about the fact that the storage marketplace has been so completely oversold on the story of lossless and low latency networks with FibreChannel that they now believe it is actually true).

So Nouva Systems built an Ethernet switch that has the necessary capabilities. It doesn’t seem to have been hugely difficult since it only took them a couple of years, and their are competitive products from companies like Woven Systems, that already have most of these features before they started.

They also started the process for a number of new Ethernet standards that allowed the storage technologies to exist.

So Cisco then bought Nuova back in in a buyout and positively threw the product into the marketplace with a blaze of hyperbole and whizzbang marketing. Three months later the products began to ship to selected companies. Yep, its the Nexus 5000 which has FibreChannel AND 10 Gigabit Ethernet in a single chassis. Hosts can now use FCoE to connect to existing FC networks and storage.

Storage Networks are actually quite small

One thing that Storage People seem to miss is that Storage Networks are really small. A few dozen FC switches is a big storage network. For Data Networks, several hundred switches is a big network. Its the importance of the data that “makes appear bigger in the mirror” and the lack of tolerance to interruption.

New Technology, New Designs

There are three missing pieces of the puzzle for Storage over Ethernet. They are:

• Design & Architecture
• Operational Skills and Management
• Technology Standards

Design & Architecture

Network Architects need time to learn the new technologies and design methods. Historically, Data Networks have not been sensitive to loss and new designs and thinking are need to handle this. Fortunately, the storage network is strictly limited to the Data Centre so this is relatively straight forward. Architects, generally, are able to adopt new technologies once the need is clear. (Enter the Account Manager……)

Operation and Support

This will require new procedures and some training, but it won’t be much different from what we do today. Some of the monitoring and analysis tools need upgrades to enhance their performance analysis, and the reporting tools that we use for monitoring bandwidth will also need upgrades. Today, this work is performed by the Storage team, and this work will move the Network Operations team.

Data Networking will need to improve it performance to match the service levels that Storage needs. But that is not a technology problem, it’s a business problem.

Standards

This is the current weakness in the Storage over Ethernet story. The key standards that control how the HOST interacts with the Network in QoS signalling and negotiation are not near complete. FCoE itself is nearing completion, and a number of new 802.1 standards that allow Ethernet networks to have new features that support much faster convergence (sub-second) and higher available bandwidth’s (SPBB) will be ready in the next year or so.

But I can’t trust it ? Can I ?

As it stands today, I can only agree that it would be a very brave decision to invest in FCoE. Lack of standards, limited experience and insufficient resources for knowledge and expertise mean that you will be doing a lot of hard work.

I personally think that Storage over Ethernet is a stupid idea and believe that Storage over IP will be far more successful for more than 90% of the market. However, I also recognise that:

• Cisco has spent more than a billion dollars bringing FCoE to market
• Brocade bought Foundry to get their own Ethernet products at a cost of $3 billion
• Companies like NetAPP and EMC have announced and are shipping FCoE enabled devices
• Emulex and QLogic have chipsets and adapters in the market. I believe Intel will have something shortly.

and the final push from Cisco is their Unified Computing Strategy for which FCoE is absolutely fundamental. And that is getting a lot of mindshare since it seems to move into markets dominated by HP & IBM.

So its time to accept the inevitable….

If there is one thing I have learned in twenty odd years of technology, it is this: Cheap Always Wins.

In the end, FibreChannel will never be big enough to be cheap like Ethernet and there is no chance that FibreChannel will continue for long now that a cheaper option exists. You can argue about technical superiority all you like, whine about feature this and feature that. but it won’t matter, in the end, cheap wins, and the Data Network is cheaper to buy, cheaper to run, and cheaper than Fibrechannel.

It’s time to start getting friendly with your Network Architect and get working on the new, cheaper, future. See if you can build a Storage Data Network that you can live with, not one that gets forced on you.

© Etherealmind for Gestalt IT, 2009. | Monofunctional or Multifunctional – Cheap always WINS
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TechTarget's annual Storage Product of the Year awards have been announced!

The mainstream media is still digesting the Oscar awards, but we in storage had our own announcement this week: TechTarget’s (now PDF) Storage magazine announced their Storage Products of the Year award for 2008.

Without further ado, the awards and my reaction!

Disk and disk subsystems

A category of much annual contention, the gold award went deservedly to the�BlueArc Titan 3200. BlueArc’s product range is small, with just a few systems on offer, but the 3200 was indeed a major upgrade. The bronze-placed�Hitachi Data Systems�AMS 2000�might easily have taken the top award as well, however, introducing major advancements in the midrange market. Taking silver was the news-making�Intel X25-E SATA Solid-State Drive.

The placement of disk drives in the same category as SAN and NAS storage systems, however, highlights something of a categorization problem for this award. Should Seagate, STEC, and Intel really be battling it out with the very systems that use their drives? I’d like to see separate component and array categories in the future.

Overlooked finalists in this category were EMC’s CLARiiON CX4, IBM’s XIV,�Isilon’s X-Series, 3PAR’s T-Class, and�Xiotech’s Emprise 7000. Any of these might have placed, and 3PAR, IBM, and Xiotech might have taken gold with a different set of judges. Looking at this broad list, however, highlights the difficulty in this award. BlueArc, HDS, and Intel deserved praise, but the rest should be recognized as well!

Storage management tools

VMware�takes a deserved gold award for�Storage vMotion, certainly the MVP in storage software this year if one considers adoption and impact.�Silver went to NetApp’s Deduplication�technology, the first (and still only) deduplication certified for primary storage use.�Bronze went to CloudNAS from�Nirvanix, an addition that allowed the storage service provider to offer services using standard NAS protocols.

EMC’s integration of VMware with ControlCenter 6.1 deserved recognition as well, as did Mimosa’s updated NearPoint 3.5. One really overlooked product is SANPulse Technologies‘ SANlogics 2.0 – go check it out and let me know if you think it deserved to place!

Networking equipment

If you haven’t experienced Riverbed’s gold-winning Optimization System (RiOS) 5.0, you might not understand just what the big deal is. 5.5 might win again next year, with solid updates to accelerate even tough WAN traffic like encrypted MAPI and signed SMB.

The silver award went to Brocade’s DCX Backbone, but time will tell if this is a wiser choice than rival Cisco’s updated MDS. I suppose if we compare only the updated DCX to what little Cisco did to the MDS last year, Brocade clearly gets the nod. But I might have skipped both products to let�IBM’s�updated�SAN Volume Controller (SVC)�have a place on this list. It added thin provisioning last year and remains IBM’s best storage product.

Bronze-winning�NetEx HyperIP 5.5�could easily have taken top honors – it’s a real value for the money in WAN acceleration! Compared to Riverbed on features it doesn’t look like much, but compare price quotes and see if your head doesn’t spin!

Backup and disaster recovery software and services

VMware�continued their roll with a gold medal for�Site Recovery Manager 1.0. Like Storage vMotion, SRM came out strong to widespread acclaim, and is likely to have a major impact in the coming years. A solid choice.

FalconStor�claims silver with their�Network Storage Server (NSS) 6.0�platform. I’m puzzled by the placement of this product in the backup and DR category, but what can you do? Bronze went to�Acronis Recovery for Microsoft Exchange, a product I don’t know much about. Must be good, though!

Backup hardware

Data Domain�is everywhere lately, and their�DD690 Deduplication Storage System�picked up a gold medal here. I hear that these things are selling like crazy, though, which I’m sure Data Domain is happier with than the award!�Permabit�took silver with their�Enterprise Archive Data Center Series. Lots of folks who know more about the backup space than I have had good things to say about it, as well as the bronze-winning�Quantum DXi7500.

Although backup isn’t my thing, I wanted to point out that�Cleversafe deserved mention with their, well, clever�Dispersed Storage Network.

© Stephen Foskett for Gestalt IT, 2009. | Reacting to the 2008 Storage Products of the Year
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