As CTO of Managed Services it is my privilege at Lightbound to have the opportunity to leverage shared storage and virtual server technologies for our customers. This will empower Lightbound and its customers to create highly efficient and cost-effective solutions in the areas of storage and server consolidation, data disaster recovery and business continuity, small business server hosting, and off-site data backup services, to name a few.
I have been administering and managing network operations in Indiana for 15 years, prior to Lightbound serving as Network Operations Manager for 8 years at The ILM Group. While with The ILM Group, our team virtualized and consolidated 65 physical windows servers to 10 vmware ESX servers across two sites. This led to the realization of real world cost savings.
Now, my goal is to leverage these and other technologies to provide value-added cost-effective and secure consolidation and managed services solutions to Lightbound customers!
Thanks for tuning in.
Sam Newberry
Cloud services providers offer hosted virtual servers and they can also offer Storage as a Service. At LightBound we offer both. A customer can opt only for storage as a service, and to this can add server virtualization services. There are two technologies we leverage to maximize cost savings, which we in turn pass on to the customer - thin provisioning and tiered storage.
Definition: A LUN (Logical Unit Number) is a single storage unit on a SAN (Storage Area Network), mapped to a server which then corresponds to a hard drive letter, like C:.
Thin provisioning is the ability to leverage available storage space from the total "pool" of storage, regardless of the number and size of LUN's. In other words, it's over subscription. The space isn't consumed when the LUN is created, but when it's actually used. So you can create twenty 1TB LUNS on your 10TB SAN, and as long as the aggregate consumption across all 20 LUNS is less than 10TB, all is well.
At LightBound we investigated how we might provide this cost savings garnered from thin provisioning directly to the customer. We found, however that for a number of reasons, it just wasn't going to be practical. First off it's a billing nightmare - customers want many things, and one of those is a consistent bill. To charge only for the actual usage would mean a substantially higher cost per "consumed" gigabyte to cover our costs, and every month an analysis of the consumed disk would have to be reported on for accurate billing. Also, how do you determine a months usage if the data ebbs and flows through the month? Maybe 95 percentile, or prorated down to the day, but again, a huge billing ordeal and often an inconsistent and potentially an unexpectedly high bill to the customer.
What we did instead was to take consideration of the average LUN usage (about 75%), and provide that cost savings to the customer. This provided for a competitive price point for disk, and a consistent and simple bill for the customer. But wait there's more - we actually figured out a way to allow the customer to leverage that extra space - snapshots.
Almost all customers utilizing storage area network solutions, including those paying for storage as a service, want to utilize snapshots. Snapshots provide point-in-time recovery capabilities of the critical data. Snapshots are freezing the data, and storing the changes (or deltas) in a different container. Thus even though the data isn't being copied, there is some consumption attributed to these snapshots. Thus the cost of snapshots is not in the number of snapshots, per say, but in the amount of disk space they consume. So here's the cost savings, and I'll apologize up front that it's a little complex, so bear with me. The customer can leverage the space they have not [yet] consumed in their LUN towards snapshot space. Here's an example:
Let's say a customer knows that they will have about 750GB of data, so they lease a 1TB LUN. Why not lease 750GB you ask? Because most operating systems don't react very well when their drive is completely full. You need to instill a little wiggle room, so 1TB it is. Now we invoke the snapshot retention schedule, which is what determines when and how often a snapshot is taken, and how long to retain that snapshot. So let's assume for the sake of discussion that we end up taking and retaining snapshots that total 200GB in disk consumption. The customer bought 1TB, used 750GB, and used another 200GB for snaps. That's only 950GB, less than 1TB, and so less than what the customer paid for. Voila! The customer doesn't have to pay for the snapshot consumption. Now, if the total of the two (data & snaps) exceeds the initial total allotment, then they're some fees, but not until then. So use that extra "wiggle room" for something fruitful like snapshots and in doing so you don't lose your wiggle room!
This was a long one, so I'll save tiered storage for next time.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
One of the most important aspects of Cloud Services that will greatly contribute to its market adoption and growth is the removal of the complexities. Companies of all shapes and sizes, most not offering a technical product or service, are simply not interested in Storage Area Network Solutions, Hosted Virtual Servers, or Virtual Storage. What they're interested in is bringing their products and services to market in the simplest most seamless means possible. Enterprises have always cringed at not only the costs of ever growing data centers, but also all the complexities attributed to every request made of their IT department. I'm not saying that IT is made up entirely of a bunch of naysayers, although there's a few out there (you know who you are). There have been many times in my career when I've had to clarify that I'm not making it complex, it is complex. But Cloud Services, or more specifically Software as a Service, is going to help simplify the process of providing to business units, and yes even end users, the services that they need without complexities involved in the underlying infrastructure.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
Historically, ergo back in the days of physical servers, I often commented that Disaster Recovery in preparation of Business Continuity is much like a dog chasing its tail. Server Collocation was often employed to have backup servers at a remote location. Well, congratulations - you've just doubled your workload, not to mention increases your costs, possibly more than two-fold. So here's where I say welcome virtualization services and cloud services! Storage Area Network Solutions (SAN's) paved the way for multiple server hosts to be able to easily and seamlessly share storage, and with boot from SAN technology, you can now replicate the data, including OS and App, to another location at the block level. No muss, no fuss. No more having to manage an entire mirror of your server infrastructure. No more installing every patch twice, no more having to upgrade your applications to the next version twice. No more having to troubleshoot twice. No more having to pay for the number of licenses you need- what? You guessed it...TWICE! Good news.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
Another reason Cloud Services is so attractive is that it leverages Server Virtualization Services and Virtual Network Services. The concept is simple: In physical legacy infrastructures the hardware is available only to or what I like to call "married to" the software. In a virtual environment utilizing shared storage, servers (or hosts) are pooled together and the software is virtually mapped to the pool of virtual storage and server hosts. If a host is lost, no problem, the virtualization services automatically and quickly remap the application to another host in the pool. And this makes Disaster Recovery preparation for Business Continuity a dream. Why? Well, I'm glad you asked! Tune in for my next blog discussing the advantages of Virtualization Services to Disaster Recovery Preparation.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
In my previous blog, I wrote of the fact that Cloud Services will go commodity, and so
LightBound is striving to set itself apart with added value beyond the base infrastructure offering. This is a two factor approach, one is the human element and the other is technical. In this blog I'll write of the human element and in a subsequent blog I'll write of the technical. And don't write off these human factors. We all know the pain attributed to hours of hold music followed by a conversation with someone who's first language is not English!
Key LightBound differentiators:
1) Tangibles: physical facilities, equipment and appearance of personnel
2) Empathy: strong communication and individualized attention to understand and address the customer’s needs
3) Reliability: the ability to perform the promised service dependably and accurately
4) Responsiveness: willingness to help customers and provide prompt service
5) Assurance: competency, courtesy, credibility and security
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
The answer to why we need and want Cloud Services and Storage Area Network Solutions is simple - money. Ok, there are a few more reasons, but I'll start with cost savings. Businesses don't generate their own electricity to produce their products and services (except the electric companies). Why? Because due to economies of scale it's much more cost effective to buy the electricity we need from the electric company. This same economies of scale applies to shared storage and server services. Cloud Services allow businesses of all sizes to buy only the services that they need at that time they need them for a small monthly recurring fee. No longer do companies have to dole out hundreds of thousands of capital to own and maintain their storage and server hardware. There are a few more advantages to Cloud Services and Virtualization Services which I will address in my next blog.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
Infrastructure as a Service is definitely going to become a commodity offering and with economies of scale, virtual network services will be a high volume, low margin product. Cloud Services providers are already offering Hosted Virtual Server, Storage Area Network Solutions, Off Site Data Backup Services, and even Storage as a Service combined with Server Collocation for pennies on the dollar compared to legacy physical network and server infrastructures. That being said, the leading contributor to competitive advantage in the Virtualization Services and Cloud Services market is going to be how the service is differentiated from the "commodities". What are those differentiators? Depends on the customers your targeting, including their size and type of business, their vertical, and other numerous variables. In my next blog I'll talk more about how LightBound is setting itself apart with added value beyond the base Infrastructure offering.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
Cloud Services is not a new idea. In fact, it's been around for more than thirty years. Remember mainframe? Mainframe was effectively a virtualization service, using the old "green screen" as the user interface. With the advent of Windows and other pioneering operating systems and applications, users wanted a more feature rich and aesthetically pleasing operating environment. And this amongst other reasons, caused a shift in the late eighties/early nineties to decentralize the mainframe, placing that computing need on the computer desktop or laptop. As we can see, this centralization/decentralization is cyclical because here we are once again centralizing are computing needs through virtualization services. So why did this come to be? Good question - and I'll answer that in my next blog.
Go Cloud!
Sam Newberry
Cloud Computing and Cloud Services represent one of the most significant shifts in information technology likely for many of us to see in our lifetimes. Embracing virtualization services, your enterprise's computing requirements being provided as a utility has great potential, promising innovations we cannot yet imagine. With this great potential, however comes great responsibility. (Thanks Aunt May) For starters, let’s talk about privacy. Here are some tips for considering cloud computing with regard to privacy:
1. Pay attention to the cloud services provider’s user agreement – look for “right to use, disclose, distribute, etc”
2. Should you decide to extract your data – does the provider retain rights to your data?
3. Put your data to the litmus test – if you wouldn’t want the government or other legal body to see your data, maybe the cloud isn’t the best solution.
Go Cloud!
Listed below are the answers to the questions I posed in Part 5 as applicable to LightBound's Shared Storage Server (s) and Hosted Virtual Server.
1. Where is the data?
All shared storage server (s) are managed within LightBound's secure datacenters in central Indiana.
2. Who owns the data?
The customer owns the data. LightBound has no rights to in any way modify, share, disseminate, or otherwise manipulate the data without the express permission of the customer.
3. Is the data backed up?
All LightBound Storage Area Network Solutions incorporate a thorough analysis with the customer to ensure that critical data is protected through backup and replication processes, aligned with the customer’s needs.
4. Can the data be extracted?
Yes, the customer is provided the means to extract their data upon request.
5. Are the data and servers volatile?
No, servers can be inactive or restarted at any time without loss of data or virtualization services.
6. Who has access to the data and servers?
Access is restrictive to only the customer and their affiliates. Unless providing managed cloud services, LightBound does not nor have access to the customers critical data.
LightBound's goal in offering Cloud Services to its customers is simple. Maintain the same level of useability and security, while adding the benefits associated with virtualization services such as high availability, scalability and flexibility with strong disaster recovery and business continuity mechanisms. LightBound is able to offer cloud services including storage as a service, network shared storage, and server virtualization services. For migration and hybrid solutions we can also bridge our existing server collocation services with all cloud services.
Go Cloud!
Defining Cloud Services:
- Public Cloud (cont.): There are many, many considerations and risks associated with public cloud which must be mitigated. Instead of attempting to address every risk, I will provide some questions to be asked whenver one is consiering cloud services.
- Where is the data?
- Who owns the data?
- Is the data backed up?
- Can the data be extracted?
- Are the data and servers volatile?
- Who has access to the data and servers?
In my next blog I will answer these questions as applicable to LightBound's Shared Storage Server (s) and Hosted Virtual Server.
So, what is cloud services? Plainly stated, cloud services is defined as "consumer and business products, services and solutions that are delivered and consumed in real-time over the Internet." What does that tell us about virtualization services? Nothing. in fact, you don't need virtualization services to provide cloud services, but they sure make it easier. Again, virtualization services is a function of cloud computing, which enables cloud services.
So next, I will start work on the differences between public cloud services, private cloud services, and hybrid cloud services.
Go Cloud!
In part one I identified the three types of cloud services: public, private, and hybrid. So what are the differences? Well, again all three offer virtual network services such as storage as a service, server virtualization services, and off site data backup service, among many other services. So before I can talk about the differences, I have to talk about their similar roots. Referred to as "Cloud Computing", this commonality between the different types of cloud services is the underlying deployment and delivery model, enabling Internet based real-time delivery of products, services and solutions. Thus "Cloud Computing" is the enabling of "Cloud Services", of which public, private, and hybrid are all a part.
Coming up will be the definition of cloud services as a whole, followed by the dissection of the three types of cloud services.
Go Cloud!
Storage Area Network solutions come in many shapes and sizes, and with the advent of virtual storage, brings about a host of new capabilities which cater well to server virtualization. LightBound offers a shared storage server platform that sets it apart from its competition. Our storage as a service provides all the high performance, scalability, and dependability of the enterprise SAN at a low monthly cost. Bundled with LightBound's virtualization services, medium and small business server hosting has never been easier and more cost effective.
Go Cloud!
Not all Cloud Services are the same. There are some stark differences between one provider's virtual network services and another. At a high level, there are three commonly accepted cloud service types: Public Cloud, Private Cloud, and Hybrid Cloud. All three offer virtual network services such as storage as a service, server virtualization services, and off site data backup service. In part two I will discuss this commonality and what Cloud Computing is and how it is different than Cloud Services.
Go Cloud!
Defining cloud services:
- Private Cloud: Cloud services operated solely for one organization. These may be managed by the organization directly or by a virtual service provider and may exist off-premise or on-premise. Considerations for private cloud are while this type of service yields minimal risk, it may not provide the scalability and agility of public cloud services.
- Public Cloud: Cloud services made available to the general public. Virtual storage and hosted virtual server(s) are owned by the virtual service provider. Considerations of this type of cloud services will be discussed in a my next blog, after which I will talk about hybrid cloud services.
Go Cloud!
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