NetApp - Absolute Architect

NetApp == Best of Breed

I talk to customers all the time about the value that NetApp brings to the table.  It's not even hard because there's so much to tell and so many wins to describe, especially in the solution areas that I focus closely on.  For starters, we've made some great strides in VTL with our deduplication offering.  As expected, we remove duplicate data so that common points of data are stored only one (1) time.  Our dedupe takes place for all of the data associated with a virtual library and works by scanning (terabytes of data) for repeating data, making references to it that point to the common set of data, and then removing and reclaiming the capacity used by the duplicate data.  It rocks.

NetApp VTL Deduplication delivers 95% (20:1) savings

ü      Fingerprinting inline, byte compare and deduplication post-process for now

ü      Leverages hardware compression for additional savings and speed

ü      Configured on virtual library basis for flexibility

I'm Just a Million Miles Away.

I'm exactly half way across the globe and I feel like I need to blog and that makes me more of a globe-blogger than a globe-trotter.  I had the pleasure and privilege of presenting the Technical Breakout Session for the APAC Technical Partner Summit here in Kovalam, Kerela in India this week. 

It's always interesting talking to our partners and hence, indirectly to our customers,  to see the technology trends that are occurring out here in addition to the new ways they are doing business in light of the economic crisis.  My counterparts out here are feeling quite positive about it all and feel that it's in fact a phenomenal opportunity to capitalize on this and really relay NetApp's value proposition and help our customers now more than ever.  I couldn't agree more.

 

One of my colleagues who works for NetApp and resides in Amsterdam, Holland jokes that we can no longer draw parallels and be analogous between our Thin Provisioning and the ways that banks loan money.  The irony was both humorous and sad at the same time.

 

So, here's to the wonderful people of NetApp India and the NetApp Partners who have so much faith and hope and drive that it would warm anyone's heart.  Well, maybe not the hearts of Evil Machines but anyone who's warm blooded would indeed share the sentiment.

Go NetApp!  ONE Team!

The Bewildered BackupBlog

My colleagues get it. My customers get it. Competitors sometimes don’t.  So, let’s call this particular blog NetApp VTL Tape Smart Sizing 101 for those out there who need a bit of education on the topic. I thought it was pretty clear and straightforward, but nevertheless, it’s always good to give a refresher course to those a bit bewildered by the concept – and let’s face it; it’s fun!

Tape Smart Sizing and disk compression work entirely independently of each other. You’ve got to remember this and it’s very important to understand this simple yet significant detail. It is the order in which they execute that makes the difference.

As previously written about, NetApp’s Tape Smart Sizing samples the data in backup streams to determine its compression ratio in the context of tape compression algorithms prior to it being compressed by our VTL’s disk compression. What does this mean exactly? Well, other VTL's do not predict how data will compress when it reaches the physical tape drive while the NetApp solution samples backup data and adjusts each virtual tape to fit (without impacting performance, mind you.)

The backup admin/user creates a virtual tape, chooses a tape technology (ie. LTO-3) all the while having no disk space pre-allocated. Then, data is written to that virtual tape. The VTL analyzes the data written and estimates tape usage base on physical tape drive compression algorithm. Finally, the VTL increases/adjusts the virtual tape size to maximize physical tape usage.

Later on when this data is read from the disks in order to be written to tape, it is uncompressed. This uncompressed data is the exact same data that the smart sizing algorithm originally sampled in the first place. Now, when the data is transferred to the tape drive, it will be compressed the same was that the algorithm predicted and will continue to work nicely as advertised, hence using your physical tapes as efficiently as possible.

I said it once, and I will say it again -- Using a VTL should NOT require you to use any additional physical tape media than if you did not have one installed in your backup environment. The NetApp VTL ensures that you don’t.

& remember kids, FUD is for DUD’s.