Mark Carlson, Toshiba, Alex McDonald, NetApp, Saqib Jang, Chelsio, John Kim, Mellanox
File vs. Block vs. Object Storage
When it comes to storage, a byte is a byte is a byte, isn’t it? One of the truths about simplicity is that scale makes everything hard, and with that comes complexity. And when we’re not processing the data, how do we store it and access it?
The only way to manage large quantities of data is to make it addressable in larger pieces, above the byte level. For that, we’ve designed sets of data management protocols that help us do several things: address large lumps of data by some kind of name or handle, organize it for storage on external storage devices with different characteristics, and provide protocols that allow us to programmatically write and read it.
In this webcast, we'll compare three types of data access: file, block and object storage, and the access methods that support them. Each has its own use cases, and advantages and disadvantages; each provides simple to sophisticated data management; and each makes different demands on storage devices and programming technologies.
Join us as we discuss and debate:
Storage devices
- How different types of storage drive different management & access solutions
Block
- Where everything is in fixed-size chunks
- SCSI and SCSI-based protocols, and how FC and iSCSI fit in
File
- When everything is a stream of bytes
- NFS and SMB
Object
- When everything is a blob
- HTTP, key value and RESTful interfaces
- When files, blocks and objects collide
After you watch the webcast, check out the Q&A blog: https://wp.me/p1kTSa-bh