How to use virtualization and green technology to reduce storage costs

Most companies adopting virtualization strategies have failed to plan how to configure enough storage, at least initially. But companies can also take advantage of technologies that leverage their existing storage capacity, including storage virtualization, automated streamlining of configuration, and data de-duplication.

These measures can help solve the problem of supplying one side of the storage usage equation-they basically take full advantage of the available physical disk space, and further ensure that most of the disk space used is used in a truly efficient manner, easing the "tight" state of disk use and retaining the disk space that is not actually requested.

But there is another side in this equation, the demand side: the size of the storage space required by a virtualization strategy. If storage requirements can be reduced, it can greatly save the storage capacity required and further cost savings.

How do you do it?

This approach is possible, but unfortunately, we still need to wait a while to see most of the functionality implemented.

"We don't yet have enough smart software to reduce storage requirements, but this technology is already in the process," says Roy Illsley, senior research analyst at Butler Group. "Another point to note is that the technology is not yet standardized." So, for example, they have VMware format and Microsoft format, but they can work together in some way. If you want to migrate a virtual machine from one platform to another, you need to convert the virtual machine. When these different files are migrated, the disk usage will drop because you can no longer handle different file formats and pointers.

In fact, Illsley that with the development of this technology, the entire virtual machine platform will become more efficient in space utilization.

"Most standard operating systems are already mature on I/O, disk, and memory-they can handle these problems effectively," he said, "but virtualization has not been around long enough to be efficient in this regard." This virtualization software will be streamlined as interoperability and standardization come along, and Intel and AMD do more to provide virtualized hardware support.

Associated virtual machine (linked clones)

That sounds good, but what can the organization do now to reduce the need for storage?

Part of the answer is probably the software intelligence implied by Illsley-by using templates and documenting changes to reduce the data that a virtual machine needs to store-a technology that is actually very similar to data deduplication and differential backups.

A simple example is the associated virtual machine used by VMware (NYSE: VMW). The associated virtual machine technology uses the concept of a parent virtual machine and then copies the associated virtual machines. The virtual disk is shared by the associated virtual machine and the parent virtual machine, but they are independent and can change the contents of the virtual disk. Any changes that occur in an associated virtual machine are not reflected in the parent virtual machine, and vice versa.

From the moment the associated virtual machine was created, its presence is a series of changes that occur in a different way from the original snapshot of the parent virtual machine, which makes it particularly space efficient. If used properly, users can create many associated virtual machines that work independently and require only a very small amount of extra storage space. However, the main disadvantage of this approach is that they can only operate if they are in contact with the parent virtual machine: The associated virtual machine cannot be accessed without the parent virtual machine being removed.

Virtual templates

Another example is the template technology for Virtual environments (VE). The virtualization system of Virtuozzo, based in parallel, Virginia, uses this technology. The Virtuozzo server has a template area that hosts the operating system and application templates. A single ve contains an operating system or one or more applications, but these ve are actually templates that can be traced back to the actual operating system or application files stored in the template area. Once application patches and updates are applied (or stored) on the main template, you can reflect all the ve on the server.

Virtuozzo has introduced a technology called EZ template. This technology can reduce the storage requirements of the template itself. The way it achieves this is to take advantage of the online Linux directory. The EZ template itself does not contain all the required packages, but rather contains metadata that points to the directory and the name of the package that is required. If a ve needs a specific Linux release, the EZ template will be able to download the latest packages so that the system has an up-to-date, fully-patched instance at all times.

DataSynapse Company in New York offers a technology that can extend the use of these templates. It uses templates so that users can reduce the storage space needed to customize the application virtual machines. The most straightforward way is to store a static virtual machine image for each application, including the entire stack of applications in the operating system, all middleware, and the application code itself.

DataSynapse technology can "decompose" virtual machines into reusable templates and build blocks based on three components of the application stack, respectively. When the virtual machine is running, the virtual machine can be combined with the template components. DataSynapse claims this technology reduces the space required for virtual machine mirroring storage by 80%.

The history of virtualization is short-lived, and with the development of virtualization technology, the technologies described above are likely to look very simple and rough in the future. But just as virtualization itself allows multiple different virtual servers to share a physical host, many different virtual servers will be able to share the same physical data in different ways in the future. This approach will effectively help virtualization technology reduce storage requirements to a reasonable level.