What is Software Defined Storage?
From physical limitations to virtual flexibility
Traditional storage has relied on proprietary hardware appliances with physical constraints limiting how data can be accessed and managed. Software defined storage abstracts the storage hardware from the management software, allowing storage resources to be virtualized and pooled together independently of the underlying infrastructure. This separation of hardware and software enables greater flexibility, scalability and multi-tenancy compared to physical storage systems.
In a Software Defined Storage model, the storage software takes control of the hardware resources and presents them as a virtual storage pool that can be dynamically allocated on demand. IT administrators can now centrally manage storage capacity, performance and protocols independent of vendor specific hardware. Policies follow the data to ensure availability and security irrespective of the physical location.
Benefits of separating the storage software from hardware
By decoupling the storage software from dedicated hardware appliances, SDS delivers several key benefits over conventional storage systems:
- Hardware independence and multi-tenancy: Storage resources from diverse hardware platforms running various operating systems are virtualized into a single pool. This abstracted pool can then be easily shared across multiple workloads in a multi-tenant environment.
- Centralized management: Storage is managed through centralized software-defined controllers. Policies can be applied globally rather than being dictated by individual array controllers. Switching between performance profiles and data services is software controlled rather than hardware limited.
- Scalability: Virtualized storage can scale without disruption by simply adding more servers and disks. Performance scales automatically by leveraging all available resources. There is no need to rip and replace hardware to scale.
- Agility: Resources are pooled and allocated on-demand rather than being permanently provisioned. Administrators have real-time insights and can react nimbly to changing workload needs. New services like snapshots, clones, data reduction are softwaredefined rather than requiring hardware upgrades.
- Hardware independence: Switching between infrastructures from different storage vendors is seamless with data and services portability. This avoids vendor lock-in and supports multi-cloud strategies. Hardware and software lifecycles can be de-coupled.
Key elements of a Software Defined Storage architecture
A mature SDS architecture comprises of the following main components:
Storage Controllers: These act as the “brains” of the SDS infrastructure to virtualize storage resources and manage workloads. They host the distributed storage software and scale independently. Examples include VMware vSAN, Cisco HyperFlex, NexentaStor etc.
Hyperconverged Nodes: Industry standard servers combined with local fast storage act as the compute and storage nodes. They provide the aggregated pool of virtualized block and file storage capacity.
Distributed Shared Storage: RAW block devices, LUNs and shares from local hyperconverged nodes are aggregated into a distributed shared pool accessible by all nodes. Technologies like erasure coding ensure high availability.
Storage Protocols: Block (iSCSI, Fibre Channel), file (NFS, SMB) and object (S3 compatible) protocols provide application-native data access semantics over the shared virtualized pool.
Policy Engine: Policies follow data to maintain performance service levels, high availability rules, security, data reduction and other QoS parameters. Policies enforce SLAs.
Management Software: Central management console provides visibility, provisions storage, monitors health and deploys updates/upgrades non-disruptively across the fabric.
Realizing the true potential of converged infrastructure
When implemented correctly, SDS converges compute, network and storage resources under centralized software defined management. This provides the pooling benefits of storage virtualization along with single-pane-of-glass operation of converged infrastructure platforms. SDS enables true resource pooling at scale by removing hardware silos and vendor lock-in. Resources are abstracted and workload optimized delivering “infinite” scalability on standard hardware. The overall infrastructure is self-healing, self-tuning and automated.
Key applications driving adoption of SDS
Several real world enterprise applications are driving the adoption of SDS architectures to deliver scalable storage for mission critical workloads:
- Virtual Desktop Infrastructure: VDI deployments require massive storage capacities and dynamic scalability. SDS supports unlimited scaling and high performance with protocol optimization for intensive desktop workloads.
- Database Deployments: Consolidating and managing databases from different vendors is challenging with physical storage but simple with software defined block storage services. Rollouts are faster with built-in high availability and disaster recovery features.
- Cloud Native App Development: Microservices, Kubernetes and containers require automated provisioning of resilient block storage independent of infrastructure. SDS natively aligns with ephemeral, stateless application modes.
- Analytics and AI: Real-time analytics and deep learning initiatives have radical storage requirements for performance, scalability and data services. SDS addresses these challenges through distributed commodity x86 infrastructure.
- VDI Testing/Dev: Internal app developer environments benefit from SDS agility in provisioning storage for VDI desktops, QA clones and testing. Capacity can scale independently of phased hardware upgrades.
SDS delivers freedom from vendor lock-in, simplicity in managing diverse storage workloads and scale without compromise. It remains a strategic priority for IT organizations seeking to empower the business through flexible, cost-effective and adaptable infrastructure.
Get This Report in Japanese Language - ソフトウェア定義ストレージ
Get This Report in Korean Language –소프트웨어 정의 스토리지
About Author:
Priya Pandey is a dynamic and passionate editor with over three years of expertise in content editing and proofreading. Holding a bachelor's degree in biotechnology, Priya has a knack for making the content engaging. Her diverse portfolio includes editing documents across different industries, including food and beverages, information and technology, healthcare, chemical and materials, etc. Priya's meticulous attention to detail and commitment to excellence make her an invaluable asset in the world of content creation and refinement.
(LinkedIn- https://www.linkedin.com/in/priya-pandey-8417a8173/)
