Towards Virtual Storage

Virtualization concepts have changed forever how we think about servers and compute.  What was once a handy tactical tool to squeeze more efficiency from servers has become the strategic foundation for tomorrow's cloud.

But virtualization concepts aren't limited to servers -- they also will make a powerful impact in the storage domain as well.  And -- when considered alongside server virtualization -- the resulting potential for builders and users of enterprise IT is nothing short of spectacular.

Server Virtualization Made Simple

I remember trying to explain to people how VMware worked way back in 2003.  I quickly learned that theoretical explanations (i.e. "abstracts logical from physical") didn't work well ; saying "you can easily cram a bunch more work on your existing servers" tended to be much better understood.

Now, several years later, I'm finding many more people who get the sheer power of these concepts, and realize that the new "unit of work" in enterprise IT is a virtual machine.  If you think about it, this fundamental abstraction is in the process of becoming completely separated from physical hardware, and -- in many cases -- physical location.

Now, How Does This Relate To Storage?

It's sometimes useful to make comparisons between how virtualization has changed the way we think about servers, and how virtualization is starting to change how we think about storage.

An easy starting point is resource efficiency.  With server virtualization, the abstraction lets you do a far better job of using compute and memory resources, raising effective utilitation.  With storage, abstracting logical from physical enables the same thing.

Once we lose the association with the physical storage device, we can start to insert all manner of efficiency-improving storage technologies: FAST, virtual provisioning, archiving, data deduplication, spin-down, etc. 

Of course, all of these new tools have to be extremely easy to use and control, but that's happening as we speak.

Another thing that the virtualization abstraction allows us to do is control service levels, i.e. performance and availability.  In the VMware world, it's easy to add or subtract server performance within a pretty significant range.  And it's becoming easier to implement anything from normal failover high availability to advanced software fault tolerance without touching the application.

In the storage world, we can do the same thing once we separate logical from physical.  We can dramatically spike storage performance by putting information on flash, or -- in the future -- dynamically relocating it closer to the user.  We can go from very low levels of information protection to extremely robust levels of availability and recoverability -- and back again.

There are more parallels and capabilities to be discussed, but I think you get the idea: separate logical from physical, and all sorts of wonderful things are now possible.

Virtualization Changes How IT Does Things

Talk to any server administrator, and ask them to compare how they used to manage their environment in the physical world, and how they now manage their environment in their virtual world, and they'll usually start to smile.

Most things are now so much easier, they'll say.  Sure, there are some new challenges to go wrestle with, but the idea of templatizing server images and invoking them dynamically is a really big deal.

The same thing has started to happen as storage gets virtualized as well.  NAS (filesystem) storage models can be inherently easier to manage since they provide a convenient abstraction.  Object models for storage go even further, and are almost trivial to configure and manage in comparison to NAS systems.  And even SAN technologies are coming along with virtual pools and dynamic provisioning models.

Like their server equivalents, virtual storage is far easier to manage than the physical kind.

Virtualization Changes How IT Services Are Delivered To The Business

I still run into IT organizations that are struggling on how to sell virtualization to the business people.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I've always found it's about two things: speed and flexibility. 

With a virtualized server environment, IT can deliver what the business needs far faster than before.  And, if the requirements change (which they always do), IT is much better positioned to react to that change.  Oh, by the way, IT will save a ton on capex and opex, meaning that there will be more IT money available to spend on new things that the business people need.

Simply put, from the business person's perspective, server virtualization enables better IT.  Faster to respond.  More flexible when things change.  And saves a boatload of money as well.

The same thing is happening as we start to think in terms of virtual storage.  To business people, it isn't really storage, it's a place to put their information.  Giving business people a place to put their information quickly and with a minimum of fuss creates value.  So does being able to react quickly to new requirements.  Being incredibly inexpensive and efficient doesn't hurt either.

Once again, from the business person's perspective, virtual storage enables better IT.  Faster to respond.  More flexible when things change.  And saves a boatload of money as well.

Putting It All Together

If you think about the hardware side of enterprise IT, you can boil it down to servers, storage and networks.

We often tend to forget that networks have been virtualized for a very long time.  It's been a very long time indeed since anyone has thought about dedicated, physical networks. 

Servers -- and desktops -- are well on their way to becoming fully virtualized entities as well.  Most everyone sees where it's going, and is trying to get their as quickly as possible.

And, now, the technology pieces are in place to fully virtualize storage as well -- by separating logical from physical we are starting to see the same sort of transformation we’ve seen in networks and servers.  IT organizations can save money.  Be more responsive to the business.  React more quickly to changing requirements.

In one sense, the ability to fully virtualize storage -- in combination with today's virtualized networks, and virtualized servers/desktops -- allows us to seriously contemplate next generation enterprise IT models (for example, private clouds), where enterprise IT is not only built differently, but operated and consumed differently.

And maybe we can start thinking entirely differently about that age-old catch phrase of "IT delivered as a service".

Comments

[Sym]

Mr. Hollis,

This is actually a comment about an earlier post of yours:

http://chucksblog.emc.com/chucks_blog/2009/01/the-information-protection-wheel.html

I was doing a search for 'empowerment and protection wheels' and your post from January came up. I am an artist doing research on a project related to Buddhist art and was struck at the mandala-like image of your protection wheel as compared to the original designs. I was wondering if you would be interested in helping me to create a cross disciplinary work of art encompassing ancient concepts and modern technology. Many thanks.
Peace and health.
-Sym

[Chuck Hollis]

Hi Sym

You'll find the wheel motif -- as well as pyramids, layer cakes, etc. -- in many IT-related materials.

The original author of that particular piece was another EMC colleague. I can put you in touch with him if you'd like?

-- Chuck

[Preston de Guise]

Hi Chuck,

As much as anything else, I liked the history of trying to explain/sell VMware ... you probably even could have summed it up by just jumping to the bit about managing machines in a virtual environment and making people smile.

Coming from a big Unix background, I sometimes wonder if there's any good correlation details on adoption of centralised virtualisation environments within an organisation and the erosion of traditional Unix platforms in favour of say, Linux (i.e., platforms that can be virtualised into the central infrastructure). This strikes me as likely, given that many of the traditional Unix environments ran or still run on on proprietary platforms that don't meld well with centralised virtualisation. While the traditional Unix vendors jumped on the bandwagon eventually and started supporting various forms of paravirtualisation, it still wasn't quite the same as full in-the-same-iron support that evolved in the x86/x86_64 market.

Traditional Unix with unvirtualised platforms has struggled to give admins a reason to smile compared to what can happen on a day to day basis for the x86/x86_64 market.

Forgetting even the big virtualisation products for a moment, talk to any admin who has even Workstation/Parallels/VirtualBox/etc on their desktop, and they'll indeed smile about how easy it is to build up test environments, with the hardware factors entirely mitigated. Many centralised virtualisation systems in organisations started not with someone coming in and selling say, ESX/vSphere, but with the actual admins selling it as a logical evolution, based on what they'd witnessed on their desktops.

I frequently take issue with the private cloud meme, but I will agree that if storage virtualisation achieves even only one fifth of what system/host virtualisation has achieved, it will shake up how we work with storage quite a bit. In short - more exciting times to come.

Cheers,

Preston.