Synopses & Reviews
"Tom Clark gives us a clear, readable guide to this emerging technology. He explains how it works, what problems it solves, and where it fits in an evolving IT infrastructure."
Milan Merhar
"Tom Clark gives us a strong overview of contemporary storage technology with storage virtualization as the central themea valuable work for all those seeking a broad understanding of storage in an IT infrastructure."
David Thiel, HP Fellow and Chair of the SNIA Technical Council
"Storage virtualization technology holds immense promise for streamlining data storage operations and making the unmanageable manageable. In this work, Tom Clark provides a comprehensive overview of virtualization concepts and the practical benefits customers can realize. Storage Virtualization is recommended reading for anyone wanting to understand this next wave of innovative networked storage technology."
John Webster, Founder and Senior Analyst, Data Mobility Group
Evaluating, Planning, and Implementing High-Value Storage Virtualization Solutions
Storage virtualization has come of age, offering IT professionals powerful new ways to simplify infrastructure, streamline management, improve utilization, and reduce costs. Now, the author of the best-selling storage books IP SANs and Designing Storage Area Networks presents an up-to-the-minute, vendor-neutral overview of storage virtualization in all its forms.
Writing for IT managers, administrators, architects, analysts, consultants, and vendors, Tom Clark explains everything from the basics to the latest emerging standards. Storage Virtualization uses realistic examples and diagrams to explain each key concept, concluding with case studies that demonstrate real-world implementation and help you assess the technology's business value. Coverage includes
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The current state of both storage virtualization technologies and the marketplace
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Relationships among files, records, data on disk, and storage interconnections
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Virtualization standards, including the Fabric Application Interface Standard
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How multiple storage systems are abstracted into virtual storage pools
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Host-based virtualization, array-based virtualization, and virtualization appliances
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Virtualization services for high availability and heterogeneous storage applications
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Virtualized SAN file systems that simplify file management and support distributed computing
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Virtualized tape backup, including Redundant Array of Independent Tape (RAIT) devices
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Policy-based storage management, application-sensitive virtualization intelligence, and other high-level automation and virtualization services
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The future of storage virtualization and storage utilities
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Extensive resource listings: vendors, industry organizations, and standards initiatives
© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Tom Clark has held technical director positions at McDATA Corporation and other storage networking companies, conducts SAN seminars and tutorials worldwide, and serves as customer liaison. A noted storage industry author and advocate, he is a former board member of the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) and has held chair positions for SNIA customer initiatives and the SNIA Interoperability Committee. His previous Addison-Wesley books include
Designing Storage Area Networks, Second Edition (ISBN 0-321-13650-0) and
IP SANs: A Guide to iSCSI, iFCP, and FCIP Protocols for Storage Area Networks (ISBN 0-201-75277-8).
© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
Table of Contents
Preface.
Acknowledgments.
1. Introduction.
Storage Virtualization Overview.
Core Concepts.
Chapter Summary.
2. Files and Records.
Application Access to Data.
Data as Files.
File Naming Conventions.
File Ownership.
Read/Write Permission Attributes.
Time Stamping.
File Size.
File Data Location.
Systematic Organization of Files.
File System Hierarchy.
Parsing the File System.
Master Tables.
File System Integrity.
File System Strategies.
Chapter Summary.
3. Data on Disk.
Volume Management.
Data as Blocks.
The SCSI Protocol and Logical Units.
Logical Units.
The SCSI Architectural Model.
SCSI Command Descriptor Blocks.
Block Aggregation.
RAID 0.
RAID 1.
RAID 0+1.
RAID 5.
RAID Controllers.
Getting Data Blocks to Disk.
Chapter Summary.
4. The Storage Interconnect.
The Path to Storage.
Storage Ports.
Storage Interconnects.
SCSI Interconnects.
Fibre Channel SAN Interconnects.
iSCSI Interconnects.
The Importance of Plumbing.
Chapter Summary.
5. Abstracting Physical Storage.
Physical to Virtual.
Logical Block Address Mapping.
Virtualized Mirroring.
Storage Metadata Integrity.
Chapter Summary.
6. Virtualization at the Host.
Logical Volume Management.
Storage Metadata Servers.
Server-based Storage APIs.
Chapter Summary.
7. Virtualization at the Storage Target.
Array-Based Virtualization.
Array-Based Data Replication.
Array-Based Point-in-Time Copy (Snapshot).
Distributed Modular Array Virtualization.
Chapter Summary.
8. Fabric-based Virtualization.
Sentient SANs.
Techniques for Switch-Based Virtualization.
The Fabric Application Interface Standard (FAIS).
Chapter Summary.
9. Virtualization Appliances.
Black Box Virtualization.
In-Band Virtualization Appliances.
Out-of-Band Virtualization Appliances.
High Availability for Virtualization Appliances.
Appliances for Mass Consumption.
Chapter Summary.
10. Virtualization Services.
Enabling Advanced Storage Services.
Pooling Heterogeneous Storage Assets.
Heterogeneous Mirroring.
Heterogeneous Data Replication.
Point-in-Time Data Snapshots.
Hierarchical Storage Management.
Chapter Summary.
11. Virtualized SAN File Systems.
Conventional File Systems.
Distributed File Systems.
Virtualizing File Systems.
Chapter Summary.
12. Virtual Tape.
Conventional Tape Backup.
Disk-to-Disk-to-Tape (D2D2T).
Virtualizing Tape Systems.
Chapter Summary.
13. Storage Automation and Virtualization.
Policy-Based Storage Management.
Application-Aware Storage Virtualization.
Virtualization-Aware Applications.
Chapter Summary.
14. The Storage Utility.
Dependencies.
Enabling the Storage Utility.
Chapter Summary.
Appendix A: Industry Resources.
Appendix B: Vendor Resources.
Appendix C: Observations and Speculations.
Glossary.
Bibliography.
Index.