In September 2009, IBM released five new technologies for information architecture at the Intelligent Information Architecture Summit, which showed that storage-centric data centers are moving in the direction of consolidation and simplicity, and that their ultimate goal is to go green.
IBM hardware is once again back in the spotlight.
Since 1993, IBM began to software and services transformation, IBM's hardware business has been rippling, until 2008 IBM announced information architecture (Information Infrastructure) strategy, and then in September 2009, the wisdom of the information architecture, the ripples gradually into a torrent. If the focus of IBM's information architecture strategy is to consolidate data centers, then the intelligent information architecture is based on further consolidation, strengthen automated management, to achieve the goal of simplicity.
With storage as the core
IBM a series of actions driven by the explosion of the data universe. 2009 May, IDC released the "economic austerity, the expansion of the digital universe," the report, claiming that the world's current digital content of about 487 billion gigabytes, and its operating costs of about 12 trillion U.S. dollars. If these data content is printed and bound into a book, its height is 9 times more than the distance from the Earth to Pluto; if the generation speed of digital content is converted into a book thickening speed, its speed is faster than NASA's fastest space shuttle.
Storage is no longer a single access device, but a good support for the use of upper information. The rapid growth of information makes the retrieval of valuable information a problem. In the past, simple information storage is no longer the most urgent needs of enterprises. On the other hand, information management work is becoming more and more burdensome, and it is urgent to remove junk information to free up more storage space. The client/server model that has been in use for decades is being transformed into a ****-enabled network architecture. Data centers are shifting from being about computing power to being about the value of information. The competition in the single product market of servers, storage, security and network has gradually evolved into the competition for comprehensive solutions with the overall data center as the core, of which storage is the key. Starting from SAN, NAS and other network storage, to storage virtualization, automatic thin provisioning, deduplication, hierarchical storage, snapshots and continuous data protection, and then to virtual tape libraries, disaster recovery, etc., storage has become the core of the new development.
The enterprise procurement strategy is also changing. In the past, when enterprises consider storage, they always think about how many terabytes of capacity to buy. Nowadays, when enterprises build information storage architecture, in addition to considering the storage capacity, they pay more attention to how to make storage adapt to the needs of business and applications. Core banking systems, telecommunications billing business systems, enterprise ERP systems, business intelligence systems, streaming media systems, historical information query systems and other different businesses and applications can use different storage technology means, such as OLTP-type database, data archiving, historical information storage.
Integration
The integration of data centers is a major trend. Consolidation eliminates redundancy and improves the operational efficiency of the equipment. Integration includes hardware and hardware integration, hardware and software integration, hardware and services integration.
In recent years, IBM through technology research and development, acquisitions, and OEM and other ways to continue to strengthen the server, storage and networking three major product lines. 2007 and 2008, IBM acquired eight companies to provide storage solutions. 2009, IBM launched the DS5020, to further improve the low and medium-end storage product line. 2009 August, IBM released the VMControl virtualization management software. VMControl virtualization management software, with the host, Power servers, x86 servers for virtualization unified management capabilities.
10 years later back to the network market is IBM in the data center integration of the most important strategic initiatives. 2009 July, IBM announced and Juniper Networks (Juniper) and Brocade (Brocade) reached an OEM cooperation agreement, OEM sales of the two companies produced by the switch and router products, making it part of the IBM series of products. IBM Systems and Technology Division, Greater China, general manager of the system storage department Hou Miao said to the media: "In the current complex enterprise environment, many data center networks have actually been closely integrated with servers and storage. Therefore, enterprises urgently need an integrated architecture." IBM this labeling production of network products can only meet the needs of the network layer and transport layer protocols, if you want to respond to business changes in a timely manner, but also to achieve a dynamic architecture, that is, to meet the needs of the network seven layer protocols. Therefore, like F5, Bluecoat these vendors focusing on application delivery, is likely to be IBM's next acquisition or cooperation with the object.
As the giant of the network industry, Cisco into the server field is seen as a challenge to IBM. But in fact, IBM did not pose a competitive posture, but continue to strengthen cooperation with Cisco, and will be resold in September 2009 Cisco's latest model of fiber-optic Ethernet storage switches. These seemingly unusual moves reflect the data center consolidation trend. Vendors are no longer competing for a city and a pool, but in the entire data center level to share a high and low. From this perspective, whether it is network vendors, storage vendors or security vendors, over time, these vendors have begun to extend to other areas of the intersection between each other, and ultimately form a you have me, I have you pattern.
If the integration of hardware, the parties are still in a state of fierce battle, then the integration of hardware and software services, IBM has ridden ahead. IBM's leading edge is mainly due to 16 years ago, Kuo Shiner placed a bet: the future, customers will be more important to those who can provide a total solution, that is, a variety of vendors to provide computer parts and components for the integration of technology programs, and technology integration. and companies that can integrate technology into a corporate process. Chip speeds, software versions, proprietary systems, and the like will die out. The information technology industry will become service-driven, not technology-driven.
Gosnell planted the seeds of the melon. September 9, 2009, IBM to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed a document showing that IBM software and services pre-tax profits in double-digit growth, from 7.2% in 2002 to 16.1% in 2008. 2009 second-quarter financial results show that IBM's total revenue reached 23.3 billion U.S. dollars, down 13% year-on-year. In the second quarter of 2009, IBM's total revenue reached 23.3 billion U.S. dollars, a year-on-year decline of 13%, but net profit of 3.1 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 12%.
IBM's new High Availability and Disaster Recovery Solutions Integration Center. According to Vincent Hsu, IBM's chief inventor and chief storage architect, unlike the physical disaster recovery centers that IBM had previously built in China for hosting operations, the High Availability and Disaster Recovery Solutions Integration Center is a virtual center for providing consulting services. The center integrates IBM's global expert resources (including data centers, systems, storage, design and other aspects of expert resources), not only can make full use of foreign advanced technology and experience, but also allows these foreign experts to understand the different needs of domestic users. The center is equivalent to a think tank.
Disaster recovery system is a fairly complex information system, including networks, servers, storage, system software, application software, etc., but also involves the cooperation of different departments. For example, IBM systems and technology to provide disaster recovery infrastructure - related hardware products, IBM consulting department to help users do the entire disaster recovery structure of the consulting, IBM services department to help users do disaster recovery implementation. In the IBM Intelligent Information Architecture Summit Forum, about 400 enterprise technology leaders from across the country in response to what is its most interested in the topic, the first choice is an integrated high-availability disaster recovery solution, the second is cloud storage.
Cloud storage is a new concept derived from the concept of cloud computing, refers to the cluster application, grid technology or distributed file system and other technologies, the network will be a large number of different types of storage devices through the application software collection to work together, *** with the external to provide data storage and business access to a system. When the core of cloud computing system computing and processing is a large amount of data storage and management, cloud computing system needs to be configured with a large number of storage devices. In this case, the cloud computing system is transformed into a cloud storage system. Cloud storage is a cloud computing system that centers on data storage and management.
From the current situation, the enterprise data storage and management needs may exceed the demand for data processing that is high-performance computing. Vincent Hsu told reporters that the U.S. government requirements, a child from birth to death of all the medical data to be retained, including a lot of unstructured data, such as imaging information. In the face of such a huge amount of data, the enterprise's own storage system is no way to support. In addition, some unexpected events may also cause a sharp increase in storage capacity in a short period of time. For example, Michael? Jackson's death, and its related to the rapid increase in the amount of information. These situations may cause the enterprise's own storage system is overloaded. the core of the IBM cloud storage is simplified. Electricity supply, for example, from power generation to transmission, distribution process is very complex, but people do not need to consider so much when using electricity, as long as the switch can be pressed. This is to use electricity as a resource. Cloud storage is the same, the most important thing is to realize the integration of the entire system, including storage, servers, networks, middleware, application software and process design to ensure system availability and security. In IBM's cloud strategy, virtualization technology is very critical.
The easy way
The world's major trend, divided for a long time will be united, united for a long time will be divided. The integration of the data center will eventually be decomposed, but the points here are not the same as in the era of the Three Kingdoms, which is to decompose the complex, huge system in a simple and easy way to the hands of the end-users. If the integration of the data center is a means of coping with the growth of data volume, then simple and easy to use is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) is always the pursuit of. In the IBM Intelligent Information Architecture Summit, the CIO said that the most urgent need to solve the storage management complexity of the problem. To solve this problem, IBM prescription is intelligent and automated.
In 2008, IBM acquired a privately held storage technology company XIV in Tel Aviv, Israel, rumors of the transaction price of $350 million. The acquisition bore fruit in 2009. Liaoning Unicom is an important customer of XIV. XIV's innovative storage architecture is self-adjusting, meeting the need for repeated provisioning of test storage space. XIV's unique minute-by-minute self-recovery feature helps us reduce risk and ensure stable system operations. XIV's smarter storage architecture provides a more efficient information application platform for the next generation of telecom services."
XIV has received such a high rating from users because of its unique design concept, which is a block-based clustered storage system comprised of standard components such as processors and SATA drives. It consists of a number of SATA disk-based data units, each of which can be thought of as a small PC, connected via standard Ethernet to form a cluster. Data is stored across all data units, and capacity and performance can change as data units are added or removed. Globally, the most important and critical information must be stored on expensive primary storage systems, while the grid-based XIV storage system reduces hardware investment while ensuring instant availability and reliability of information.
Dramatically, the chairman of XIV is none other than Moshe Yanai, known to many as the father of EMC's flagship storage array, Symmetrix. as EMC's head of engineering, Moshe Yanai was the chief architect of Symmetrix.
In addition to acquisitions, IBM has invested heavily in its own research and development, and Smart Tiering storage technology is one of them. Currently, 36% of the data analysis is done manually. However, the way through the manual data analysis has been outdated. Data is not static, but dynamic. Intelligent hierarchical storage technology can automatically store data on the right media at the right time through intelligent algorithms, and can transparently realize data movement. Automating the management of mixed loads can have a similar effect as Intelligent Hierarchical Storage.
Whether it is intelligent hierarchical storage technology or mixed-load automated management, its **** the same point is to use storage software to do analysis to see where the system has a hot spot, and accordingly redistribute resources to automatically migrate the hot spot of the data to other storage media to achieve load balancing. This is also a concrete manifestation of the idea of change on demand.
The speed of flash memory is 100 times faster than disk, and the energy consumption is less than 1/3 of disk. if the storage hotspots are concentrated in flash memory, it can greatly reduce the workload of other media, and the speed of the whole system will be faster. This is the idea of constant change. At present, some IBM academicians are doing research on the basic science of solid-state storage. In the future, IBM plans to put the flash memory on the cache, and do not need batteries.
In addition, storage virtualization, deduplication, full-performance storage (next-generation XIV technology), storage management technology, and tape and disk encryption, in all aspects of the data center to simplify the architecture, to achieve easy to use, energy-saving results.
Raindrops in the clouds
A common example in martial arts novels is that a top swordsman can use both hands to make a sword, but the enemy tends to only notice his right hand, and as a result, reveals a hole in the sword, and gets hit with a fatal sword from the swordsman's left hand.
IBM's left hand is 16 years ago, Kuo Shiner placed another bet: independent computing will give way to networked computing. If it was a bet on the popularity of the Internet at the time, it may now be understood as Internet-based service-oriented cloud computing.
In recent years, IBM has divested PCs, hard disks, drives, monitors and printers, and other hardware business, only servers and storage is unchanged. This is not only because the server and storage business can make money, more importantly, they are at the heart of the data center.
IBM is working to strengthen the deployment of these two product lines, and back to the networking market, so that its hardware back in the spotlight. All of this suggests that IBM is throwing down the gauntlet for Koksner's cloud bet.
Everything IBM is doing to consolidate and simplify its data centers is accumulating steam for the cloud of cloud computing. What cloud computing requires is a much larger consolidation of data, and then a shunting out of computing to users. This first centralized, then distributed process will certainly promote the development of new information architecture model. As for when it will rain, let's wait and see.