Acopia's Vision
Intelligent file virtualization is just the first step in Acopia Networks' vision of leveraging intelligence in the network to simplify file management and optimize the delivery of file-based information assets.
With files now the pervasive method for managing business data, Acopia has recognized the need for a unified file management strategy - a new enterprise-wide architectural and methodological approach delivering both scale and scope. Encompassing file virtualization, network-based policy enforcement, and globally distributed access, Acopia's file area networking (FAN) architecture is inclusive and open so that partners and customers can easily integrate with and build upon it.
Ever-increasing amounts of unstructured data and highly complex infrastructures have created a complexity crisis that demands a network-resident solution to management. Without these changes, new application approaches such as SOA and dynamic web content, when coupled with unrelenting growth rates, will break traditional file-based architectures within the next several years. A FAN-centric solution resolves these issues by allowing organizations to leverage their network and think globally about file controls.
This technology and market shift is analogous to changes that took place in the 1990s, as storage area networks (SANs) became a popular means to improve heterogeneity and capacity provisioning for block-mode data. SANs offered some relief to rapid growth by virtualizing the physical connections between the servers and storage devices. In the pursuing years, SANs became a multi-billion dollar global market. Today the problems of growth and complexity are similar; however, the challenge is now managing file-based information rather than raw blocks.
Files are very different than blocks because they have a business context. Metadata can be used to apply policies to the file - for instance how long to keep data, where to store it, when to shred it, and so forth. But this can only be accomplished with an approach that is file-aware, such as a FAN.
An effectively deployed FAN will include:
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Heterogeneous support for a common management framework that is future-proofed against architectural choices over time
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Fine-grained, real-time policy-based controls across the entire infrastructure
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Network residency.
Acopia's FAN vision will allow servers and applications to deploy particular tools as required, regardless of platform, while allowing the storage layer to expand in a completely open fashion. Moreover, this must all be accomplished in a gradual deployment, so organizations will not be required establish an entirely new file infrastructure.
The greatest promise of the FAN is that file storage - whether its file servers or NAS systems, from heterogeneous vendors - can be networked in an intelligent fashion to make discrete and individual assets greater than the sum of their parts. As a pioneer in simplifying file storage management with intelligent networking, Acopia will continue to lead the industry with its innovative FAN vision.
To learn more about how FAN, bolstered by intelligent file virtualization, will dramatically change file management, download The Taneja Group's recent report, "Intelligent File Virtualization and the FAN Paradigm," available at: http://searchstorage.bitpipe.com/detail/RES/1159445967_652.html.