I was reading an article on SearchStorage today (Dispelling myths: WAFS and remote backup) about WAFS (Wide Area File System).

A really good article that talks about the realities of what WAFS brings to the table for a distributed enterprise. Unlike many storage technologies, I think WAFS is a fine example of a point solution that offers customers options for augmenting and improving existing environments operations.

Most customers get caught up trying to replace what they have – sometimes due to vendor influence. WAFS is a great technology that offers customers a way to protect their remote sites data while delivering on the promise of centralized administration, protection and backup. All without removing what’s already in place!

Here’s an excerpt from the referenced article that does a good job of briefly summarizing what WAFS is: “Simply put, WAFS technology allows a remote office to interact with a corporate data center as if it were local — allowing file access and data transfers in almost real time.”

The gory details of how WAFS is implemented can be found at the various vendor websites. I have always seen it as a way to “extend” corporate data to remote sites. The data is maintained centrally but made available and cached locally at the remote sites. Changes get maintained and propagated appropriately. This means you can keep all of your critical data centrally located in a secure data center while allowing speedy access to the data at remote sites - even over slow links.

One of the things I really like about WAFS is that it compliments existing storage infrastructures. So many times vendors try to force customers to “fork-lift” the old stuff and plug in their stuff. What a waste! Storage is storage – even if it’s old. As long as it’s still meeting your need, keep it. If it’s not, then go ahead and redeploy under your desk as you new “MP3 server”.

In any case, when looking at new technologies, my philosophy is to look at how it compliments what I already own. WAFS products go a long way to meeting that requirement for me.

Anyone have any good (or bad) stories about WAFS to share?

Joe

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 20th, 2005 and is filed under General, Storage Applications, Advisor - Joe Disher. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.