NAS and Storage Tiering (hot & cold blocks)

[orb]

Hi,

Today more vendors enable you to move cold blocks to object storage, NetApp fabric pool come to my mind.
While it doesn't go well along with VM workloads, I could picture this running along a NAS with cold data growing over time. Do you have already tested this kind of scenario with a NAS backup feature?

Oli

[HannesK]

Hello,
you mean whether a backup software can replace hierarchical storage management software (HSM)?

That's two different concepts. So for backup software (talking about backup software only), the answer is "no".

Today more vendors enable you to move cold blocks to object storage

HSM exists since decades. Files are replaced by links / stub files. End users don't see the difference. It's always interesting how customers are surprised how difficult it is to migrate to a different vendor with that approach

I could picture this running along a NAS with cold data growing over time

do you have more details what you mean?

Best regards,
Hannes

[orb]

Hi HannesK!

I am thinking out loud here. My curiosity aims to storage with object storage tiering in particular and what is the impact with a NAS backup software on the top. What operation excepting a full would be detrimental since you might need to move your data from cold to hot.

I have in mind applications which are still using block storage, SMB or NFS to storage but keep their metadata in a traditional SQL DB.

Do you have the first-hand experience or during the development you tested this kind of scenario.

Regards,
Oli

[HannesK]

Hello,

My curiosity aims to storage with object storage tiering in particular and what is the impact with a NAS backup software on the top

it depends on the implementation / configuration of the stub files. In some cases a backup software will recall all data from the tiered storage location (no matter whether S3 or something else). It depends on the HSM product you use and how you configure it. We build something for example for Azure File-Sync https://www.veeam.com/blog/azure-file-s ... ackup.html

I recommend testing with the product of your choice.

My other first-hand experience is customers that tried to migrate to a different storage vendor. When the tiered capacity is multiple times larger than the main storage. It's painful

Best regards,
Hannes

[orb]

Thanks,

first, I learn more about Azure File Sync and read your blog post next and keep in mind your input.

My other first-hand experience is customers that tried to migrate to a different storage vendor. When the tiered capacity is multiple times larger than the main storage. It's painful

I won't argue with that

Oli