Talked to a startup the other day that looks interesting – Zettar. It wasn’t the name that caught my attention.
Object storage is big in clouds. But objects aren’t compatible with standard apps: Powerpoint expects files, not objects.
Cloudstores like Amazon and Azure aren’t compatible with each other. Lock-in.
And you can’t run an internal cloud that is compatible with them either – they won’t sell you their software.
Double-secret lock-in.
Zettar founder Chin Fang’s idea is 2-fold.
- A virtual file system that front-ends several cloud services.
- Software that duplicates server-side cloud storage services.
The pitch:
The Zettar ZCloud Virtual Appliance (ZCloud) enables you to setup an Amazon S3 sandbox instantly on any computer, even a tiny netbook. Developers and QA engineers can use it to prototype, analyze, test, and stage a cloud application locally, before rolling it out onto Amazon Web Services (AWS). Thus, ZCloud can improve, simplify and speed up your development, and minimize AWS S3 development costs.
The StorageMojo take
Seems like a good idea. And Chin’s team did a good job on their web site.
Domesticating cloud storage will be a continuing process for the next 10 years. Zettar’s Z-cloud is a good start.
If you try out their software please tell us how it goes, I’m sure others would be interested.
Courteous comments welcome, of course. Don’t confuse Zettar with cloud NAS provider Zetta a cloud enterprise NAS provider who just raised another $11.5 million. I like them too.
Interesting start-up Robin. Of course if you want an instant private cloud with a Standard interface, folks should check out the CDMI Reference Implementation. We have a work in progress release available here:
http://www.snia.org/forums/csi/programs/CDMIportal
It’s Java based, the source is there under a BSD license and it sits on top of your existing file system (i.e. your laptop’s)
It would be great if Zettar could use this to add CDMI to their handy application.
— mark
sounds kind of like parascale? HDS bought them not too long ago after they failed to get traction, they too abstracted cloud storage behind a NAS platform, though I don’t recall if parascale provided their own cloud storage or if it abstracted 3rd party object stores.
You *can* run private object storage: See the Eucalyptus project (http://open.eucalyptus.com/) and also OpenStack (http://www.openstack.org/).
So Zettar is interesting… why?
@Robin, thanks for the nice write-up. @Mark, many thanks for your comment. In fact, SNIA CSI Chairman Val Bercovici has been encouraging me to do exactly what you suggested for sometime.
Nevertheless, we would like to complete the reproduction of server-side interfaces and functions of marketing leading object storage services first – we should be done soon. Then we will expand our horizon as our resources permit. Architecture-wise, our Z-cloud is designed to be highly extensible right from the start.
FYI, all our core software have been implemented in modern C++ for superlative performance, efficiency, potential for horizontal scalability, product packaging cleanness, and minimal external dependencies.
Best Regards,
Chin
@nate, Parascale created a clustered file system. It’s not an object based storage platform. Parascale and Zettar are in two different spaces.
@PJ, Zettar’s focus is to resolve CIOs’ three concerns in using object based storage clouds: 1. lack of standards, 2. vendor lock-in, and 3. availability issues
We resolve them using the 2-folded approach (i.e. via federation) that @robin succinctly summarized in his write-up. OpenStack and Eucalyptus’ Warlus sub-system are not the solutions to such concerns.
BTW, the local sandbox actually is just a prelude of a set of products that will be coming out from Zettar for datacenters and enterprises.
I’ve just tried Zettar as we use Amazon extensively. I’ve found it really useful, so thanks for the link Robin
Cool.
Move FS up the stack, or down the stack.
No merging HW/SW at random for imaginary gains and sales fluff.
It’ not lock in, it’s M.A.D.
I keep coming back to storage is a utility, and utilities get simplified and regulated. For good reason.
What vendors are doing now sounds as sophistcated as the AC versus DC wars for early days metro supply. The public understanding has not caught up, so there’s business angling flux messing the game.
Designed myopia.
What the vendors fail to understand is the built in obsolescance they are designing is their own.
What new entrants fail to understand is how to name themselves in any way which will give them marketing traction.
Meanwhile, i just get new good pitches which are priced against obsolescant thought and 1990s tech. Which don’t work.
Next!
– john
@John, regarding your comment “I keep coming back to storage is a utility, and utilities get simplified”, please review @robin’s succinct and eloquent description of our 2-fold key idea.
Zettar makes local and cloud storage available with either local or cloud interfaces and gives you uniform access to the multiple storage clusters and clouds.
Nate: ParaScale created a private cloud storage software product. Under the covers, there is a shared-nothing distributed object store wrapped in POSIX style virtual filesystems exportable via NAS protocols. Multi-tennant shared infrastructure for storage as a service use cases optimized for streaming i/o applications. Architecturally it’s similar to Panasas and Google filesystem with the addition of standard protocol processing on each node, so no custom clients.
Isn’t this turning the whole thing upside down? Wasn’t the cloud meant to enable developers to quickly deploy something without having to setup an infrastructure? So now they have to set up an own storage cloud before throwing it to the cloud for a quick test before deploying it on an own system?
Parascale (now Hitachi) is indeed a different thing
Alex Nealy, your comment is a concise “under the hood” description of the Paracale product. Actually, it’s often described as an ” object-based cluster file system.” The top hits of a google search using “parascale cluster filesystem” should make this clear. Note however that Zettar’s focus is to federate object storage clouds – different from that of Parascale’s.
Tom, regarding your comment “Isn’t this turning the whole thing upside down?” IMHO the answer is “not at all”. I invite you to review http://www.zettar.com/zettar/products/zcloud/benchmarks
Given such a speed differential, your time saving is very significant!
There are real financial impact too. You are invited to review http://storagemojo.com/2010/10/22/openstorage-summit-next-week/#comment-211737
Furthermore, Zettar sandbox takes a couple minutes to be ready to use. Please review http://www.zettar.com/zettar/support/documentation/installation. A recent blog of mine should provide more justifications http://www.zettar.com/zettar/blog/the-similarity-between-ssds-and-private-storage-clouds
@ Chin Fang,
I was off on a tangent. I’ve read a bunch since, and reckon you’re cool.
But I fear a “middleware” battle, broker, OR mapping.
Do you have an AMI?
My problem is the cost of the pipe to get data out. (forget legal for moment)
But i see you may have reconciled one idea, which is near-line analytics.
I mean, I throw a big dataset at S3 via you, run my apps on Elastic, done. Now, i need to check back what data we just talked to, and you do that.
I keep the store, I can go via you for another look with a different app.
Am I not now just putting another layer in?
It’s a bit like how data warehouses started. But maybe good enough, in the right hands.
Clear, concise, pricing is what I need to see. We all fudge this, that is business. But I worry you are just a prosective gatekeeper.
Whoever pitchs, first line of “benefits” as “faster time to market” needs to read Brooks.
What exact lack of standards do you fix? What lock – in do you fix, allowing you sell a gateway?
“prelude”. But I cannot buy roadmaps.
Over to you, how much does it cost me to put PB’s transfer through your system?
– john
@ Chin Fang
What is the relationship between ZCloud Platform and ZCloud Sandbox?