A new SNIA specification offers a unified approach to managing storage and servers in environments like hyperscale and cloud infrastructures. SNIA on Storage recently sat down with SNIA member volunteers from the Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group (SSM TWG), who just announced the completion of Version 1.0 of the SNIA SwordfishTM storage management specification, to learn more.
SNIA on Storage (SOS): What prompted SNIA to begin work in this area?
SSM TWG: We have been looking at what IT administrators are doing in today’s data centers, and what they will need to do in the future with storage equipment and storage services. We wanted to simplify the way storage is allocated, monitored, and managed, so the SNIA SSM TWG was formed and members collaborated to develop SNIA Swordfish, a specification that extends the DMTF’s (Distributed Management Task Force) Redfish™. Redfish is an open industry standard specification and schema that specifies a RESTful interface and utilizes JavaScript Object Notation and Open Data Protocol to help customers integrate solutions within their existing tool chains.
SOS: What does SNIA Swordfish do?
SSM TWG: Our SNIA Swordfish specification is based on Redfish’s easy-to-use RESTful interface, and provides a scalable storage management application programming interface (API) that can handle all necessary storage management functionality, including file and block storage provisioning, volume mapping and masking, replication, and capacity and health reporting tools. SNIA Swordfish can assist in handling tasks such as locating storage with a suitable class of service and allocating it to a server or a virtual machine.
SOS: How will SNIA Swordfish fit into data center management?
SSM TWG: SNIA Swordfish was designed to support management use cases that focus on what IT administrators need to do with storage equipment and storage services in a data center. Because it extends the DMTF Redfish API into storage management, it helps provide a unified approach for managing servers, storage, and network fabrics. This unified approach will make it easier to create management software tools that can deal with operations involving multiple management domains. SNIA Swordfish is also designed to support vendor specific functionality alongside standardized functionality, to allow for future needs.
SOS: Which companies are working on SNIA Swordfish in the TWG?
SSM TWG: Our TWG members represent many of the leading companies in the storage industry today, including Broadcom, Dell EMC, HPE, Intel, Microsoft, NetApp, Nimble Storage, and VMware.
SOS: Where can IT administrators and data center managers learn more about SNIA Swordfish?
SNIA Swordfish will be a highlight of the SNIA Storage Developer conference September 19-22 in Santa Clara, CA, with overview and deep dive presentations. These presentations will be made publicly available on the SDC website at www.storagedeveloper.org. SNIA Swordfish has its own webpage at www.snia.org/swordfish. Those who would like to submit feedback on the specification can do so either via the SSM TWG (SNIA members) or the SNIA Feedback Portal (all).