Category: Persistent Memory

The Alphabet Soup of Storage Networking Acronyms Explained

Chad Hintz
At our most recent webcast, “Everything You Wanted to Know About Storage But Were Too Proud To Ask: Part Turquoise – Where Does My Data Go?, our panel of experts dove into what really happens when you hit “save” and send your data off. It was an alphabet soup of acronyms as they explained the nuances of and the differences between:
  • Volatile v Non-Volatile v Persistent Memory
  • NVDIMM v RAM v DRAM v SLC v MLC v TLC v NAND v 3D NAND v Flash v SSDs v NVMe
  • NVMe (the protocol)
As promised during the live event, here are answers to all the questions we received. Q. Is SRAM still used today? A. SRAM is still in use today as embedded CACHE (Level 1/2/3) within a CPU and very limited in external standalone packaging… This is due to cost and size/capacity. Read More

Q&A – When Compute, Networking and Storage Intersect

J Metz
In Part Vermillion of our SNIA Ethernet Storage Forum (ESF) “Everything You Wanted To Know About Storage But Were Too Proud To Ask” webcast series – we examined the terms and concepts are at the heart of where compute, networking and storage intersect. That’s why we called it “What if Programming and Networking Had a Storage Baby” If you missed the live webcast, you can watch it on-demand. The discussion from our panel of experts generated a lot of good questions. As promised, here are answers to them all.  Read More

Unlock the Power of Persistent Memory in Containers

Chad Thibodeau
Containers and persistent memory are both very hot topics these days. Containers are making it easier for developers to know that their software will run, no matter where it is deployed and no matter what the underlying OS is as both Linux and Windows are now fully supported. Persistent memory, a revolutionary data storage technology, will boost the performance of next-generation packaging of applications and libraries into containers. On July 27th, SNIA is hosting a live webcast “Containers and Persistent Memory.” Read More

The Too Proud to Ask Train Makes Another Stop: Where Does My Data Go?

Chad Hintz
By now, we at the SNIA Storage Ethernet Storage Forum (ESF) hope you are familiar with (perhaps even a loyal fan of) the “Everything You Wanted To Know About Storage But Were Too Proud To Ask,” popular webcast series. On August 1st, the “Too Proud to Ask” train will make another stop. In this seventh session, “Everything You Wanted to Know About Storage But Were Too Proud To Ask: Turquoise – Where Does My Data Go?, we will take a look into the mysticism and magic of what happens when you send your data off into the wilderness. Once you click “save,” for example, where does it actually go? Read More

Around the World, It’s a Persistent Memory Summer

Marty Foltyn
This summer, join SNIA as they evangelize members’ industry activity to advance the convergence of storage and memory. SNIA is participating in the first annual European In-Memory Computing Summit, June 20-21, 2017 at the Movenpick Hotel in Amsterdam.  SNIA Europe Vice-Chair and SNIA Solid State Storage Initiative (SSSI) Co-Chair Alex McDonald of NetApp keynotes a session on SNIA and Persistent Memory, highlighting SNIA work on an NVM programming model and persistent memory solutions available today and SNIA is a sponsor in the exhibit hall. Read More

SNIA Highlights Persistent Memory and Scalable Storage Management at Storage Field Day 13

khauser 2 Comments

Following enthusiastic response to their first Storage Field Day in March, SNIA is returning to the lineup on June 15, 2017. Storage Field Day events bring together innovative IT organizations and independent thought leaders to share information and opinions in a presentation format that is lively – and live streamed.

SNIA will present Storage Field Day #13 at their Technology Center in Colorado Springs, CO where organizer Stephen Foskett and a dozen delegates will tour the facility and interact with SNIA members on persistent memory and scalable storage management – two hot storage topics that consumers and the industry want to learn more about.

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Your Questions Answered on Non-Volatile DIMMs

Marty Foltyn Leave a comment
  by Arthur Sainio, SNIA NVDIMM SIG Co-Chair, SMART Modular SNIA’s Non-Volatile DIMM (NVDIMM) Special Interest Group (SIG) had a tremendous response to their most recent webcast:  NVDIMM:  Applications are Here!  You can view the webcast on demand. Viewers had many questions during the webcast.  In this blog, the NVDIMM SIG answers those questions and shares the SIG’s knowledge of NVDIMM technology. Have a question?  Send it to nvdimmsigchair@snia.org. 1. What about 3DXpoint, how will this technology impact the market? Read More

Latency Budgets for Solid State Storage Access

J Metz

New solid state storage technologies are forcing the industry to refine distinctions between networks and other types of system interconnects.  The question on everyone’s mind is: when is it beneficial to use networks to access solid state storage, particularly persistent memory?

It’s not quite as simple as a “yes/no” answer. The answer to this question involves application, interconnect, memory technology and scalability factors that can be analyzed in the context of a latency budget.

On April 19th, Doug Voigt, Chair SNIA NVM Programming Model Technical Work Group, returns for a live SNIA Ethernet Storage Forum webcast, “Architectural Principles for Networked Solid State Storage Access – Part 2” where we will explore latency budgets for various types of solid state storage access. These can be used to determine which combinations of interconnects, technologies and scales are compatible with Load/Store instruction access and which are better suited to IO completion techniques such as polling or blocking.

In this webcast you’ll learn:

  • Why latency is important in accessing solid state storage
  • How to determine the appropriate use of networking in the context of a latency budget
  • Do’s and don’ts for Load/Store access

This is a technical seminar built upon part 1 of this series. If you missed it, you can view it on demand at your convenience. It will give you a solid foundation on this topic, outlining key architectural principles that allow us to think about the application of networked solid state technologies more systematically.

I hope you will register today for the April 19th event. Doug and I will be on hand to answer questions on the spot.

SNIA Activities in Security, Containers, and File Storage on Tap at Three Bay Area Events

khauser Leave a comment

SNIA will be out and about in February in San Francisco and Santa Clara, CA, focused on their security, container, and file storage activities.

February 14-17 2017, join SNIA in San Francisco at the RSA Conference in the OASIS Interop: KMIP & PKCS11 booth S2115. OASIS and SNIA member companies will be demonstrating OASIS Key Management Interoperability Protocol (KMIP) through live interoperability across all participants. SNIA representatives will be on hand in the booth to answer questions about the Storage Security Industry Forum KMIP Conformance Test Program, which enables organizations with KMIP implementations to validate the protocol conformance of those products and meet market requirements for secure, plug-and-play storage solutions. And Eric Hibbard, Chair of the SNIA Security Technical Work Group and CTO Security and Privacy, HDS Corporation, will participate in the “Can I Get a Witness? Technical Witness Bootcamp” session on February 17.

The following week, February 21-23, join SNIA at Container World in Santa Clara CA. Enabling access to memory is an important concern to container designers, and Arthur Sainio, SNIA NVDIMM Special Interest Group Co-Chair from SMART Modular, will speak on Boosting Performance of Data Intensive Applications via Persistent Memory. Integrating containers into legacy solutions will be a focus of a panel where Mark Carlson, SNIA Technical Council Co-Chair from Toshiba, will speak on Container Adoption Paths into Legacy Infrastructure. SNIA experts will be joined by other leaders in the container ecosystem like Docker, Twitter, ADP, Google, and Expedia . The SNIA booth will feature cloud infrastructure and storage discussions and a demonstration of a multi-vendor persistent memory solution featuring NVDIMM!  (P.S. – Are you new to containers? Get a head start on conference discussions by checking out a December 2016 SNIA blog on Containers, Docker, and Storage.)  

Closing out February, find SNIA at their booth at USENIX FAST from February 27-March 2 in Santa Clara, CA, where you can engage with SNIA Technical Council leaders on the latest activities in file and storage technologies.

We look forward to seeing you at one (or more) of these events!

 

SNIA Recognizes Outstanding Individual and Group Contributors

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The backbone of SNIA is its passionate and dedicated volunteers – over 3,500 from 160 companies involved in storage and technology.  At the end of each year, SNIA members vote anonymously to recognize both individuals and groups who have made significant contributions over that year to advancing SNIA’s mission to lead the storage industry worldwide in developing and promoting vendor-neutral architectures, standards, and educational services that facilitate the efficient management, movement, and security of information. At the January 2017 Annual Members Symposium, SNIA was pleased to honor the following volunteer members and groups:

Individual Awards

Jim Pappas from Intel Corporation received the Exceptional Leadership Award for his outstanding leadership advancing the cause of persistent memory within SNIA leading to an impact both on the industry and the Association.  The recent 5th annual SNIA Persistent Memory Summit, chaired by Pappas, drew over 500 attendees both live and online, and featured sessions demonstrating the deliverance of convergence of storage and memory.

 

Patrick Boyd from Dell Corporation received the Unsung Hero Award for working tirelessly under the radar, expecting no accolades for his major contributions to the SNIA Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group.

 

Doug Voigt from Hewlett Packard Enterprise received the Volunteer of the Year Award for his consistent contributions during 2016 furthering the work of the SNIA Non-Volatile Memory Programming Technical Work Group.

 

Richelle Ahlvers from Broadcom Limited received the New Contributor of the Year Award for her leadership of a new SNIA program within the SNIA Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group and contributions to driving a new SNIA Swordfish v.1.0 specification in nine months.

 

Group Awards

 

The SNIA Storage Management Initiative received the Outstanding Achievement of a SNIA Technology Community Award for advancing for SNIA the cause of storage management with its achievements leading to an impact on the industry.

 

SNIA Japan received the Significant Contribution(s) by a Committee or Regional Affiliate Award for its work to advance data storage technology in the industry.

The SFF Task Force received the Significant Impact by a Previously Existing Technical Work Group (TWG) or Task Force Award for its member work and efforts to establish the SNIA SFF Technology Affiliate (TA) Technical Work Group to carry forth the longstanding SFF Committee work efforts that has operated since 1990 until mid-2016.

The SNIA Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group received the New SNIA Group of the Year Award for its innovative, groundbreaking work in providing a unified approach for the management of storage and servers in hyperscale and cloud infrastructure environments, making it easier for IT administrators to integrate scalable solutions into their data centers.