ViPR 2.0 Software-Defined Storage

Summary on ViPR 2.0:

• enables customers implementing next-generation applications and big data analytics to explore new approaches to their storage infrastructure.
• now supports block storage alongside previously supported object and HDFS. All now run against commodity drives.
• now supports cloud-scale capabilities of geo-replication and distribution.
• enables customers to automate the management of both traditional (file, block) and new (object, HDFS) storage infrastructures in a consistent way. This capability improves data center reliability, lowers cost and provides IT with an accessible bridge to the 3rd Platform of IT.
• now supports many additional third-party storage arrays through OpenStack.

At EMC World 2014, EMC Corporation announced ViPR 2.0, a software-defined storage platform that simplifies the management of both existing and new storage infrastructure, and provides new data services to underpin next-generation applications and big data analytics.

ViPR 2.0 Object/HDFS model

The 3rd Platform of IT is based on the trends of cloud, mobile, social and big data and is creating a new world of opportunity – and competitive threat – for businesses in every industry. New mobile applications are delivering unique and frictionless experiences for customers to both interact and transact. These applications serve hundreds to millions of users and generate 1,000x the amount of information as their predecessors. These new applications will require new storage infrastructures but they must run alongside the back-office applications that run the business today.

ViPR 2.0 builds a bridge to the 3rd Platform by enabling customers to manage both existing and new storage infrastructures in an automated way. It also plugs into higher-level management and orchestration tools from VMware, OpenStack and Microsoft so storage can be a part of broader data center workflows.

The value of ViPR is that it separates the Control Plane (which is the ability to centrally manage various storage array functions including discovery, provisioning and reporting through ViPR Controller) from the Data Plane (which are advanced data services that run on top of storage arrays through ViPR Data Services delivering, for example, object capabilities to file-based platforms or block capabilities to commodity platforms). By decoupling the Control Plane from the Data Plane, ViPR simplifies management of intelligent arrays while leveraging their underlying intelligence in an automated way that is based on policy.

New ViPR Data Services: Supports New Storage Types and New Applications
In addition to its management capabilities, ViPR Data Services have also been enhanced. Support for commodity drives is added to the existing object and HDFS storage implementation along with block data services, based on EMC ScaleIO.

ViPR 2.0 has added multi-site support through new geo-scale storage capabilities which provide data access, integrity and protection. This means ViPR Object Data Services can now span multiple locations and offer  patent pending geo-replication and geo-distribution capabilities to deliver new levels of efficiency and performance. ViPR Object Data Services also add additional compliance capabilities to ensure federal, healthcare and other industry requirements are met, and provide support for the EMC Centera CAS API. This allows Centera customers to maintain the retention and compliance features offered by their applications on any ViPR-supported platform with no software changes required. New ViPR Data Services provide access to data wherever users are, wherever the data is, whenever it’s needed.

In addition, ViPR 2.0 also adds ViPR Block Services, new data services based on ScaleIO server-SAN software. ViPR Block Services deliver block storage capabilities to any ViPR managed commodity storage array.

Enhanced ViPR Controller: Bridge to the 3rd Platform of IT
ViPR Controller now natively, and through a new OpenStack Cinder plug-in, supports commodity as well as even more storage arrays. The list of natively supported arrays now includes EMC, HDS and NetApp – as well as commodity storage. Additionally, through the OpenStack Cinder plug-in, ViPR supports Dell, HP and IBM arrays. With expanded support, ViPR now supports the majority of the storage arrays in the market today. In addition, ViPR 2.0 delivers simple ‘pane-of-glass’ management for customers to automate and standardize the management of an existing storage infrastructure, while bridging the support for the new storage infrastructure that is policy-driven.

ViPR 2.0 also extends support for EMC arrays with improved integration and management of EMC VPLEX and RecoverPoint. This also includes the addition of multi-site capabilities and augmented multi-tenancy to support geo-scale storage environments that scale to hundreds of tenants in multiple locations all through a single namespace.

According to a recent Principled Technologies, Inc.‘s report, “EMC ViPR makes storage automation an excellent companion for virtualization administrators, and delivers on the promises of a software-defined data center. ViPR automation reduces the risk of human error, and the need for lengthy management reviews, and can make your organization more nimble.”

Enhanced Software-Defined Storage Suites
EMC’s software-defined storage software suites, ViPR SRM and Service Assurance Suite have also undergone enhancements. The updates to these suites are designed to give customers maximum visibility into complex multi-vendor environments. In addition to support for a range of EMC and third-party platforms, ViPR SRM delivers improved integration with ViPR and VPLEX, providing new chargeback capabilities to enable organizations to offer IT-as-a-Service beyond SLAs. Enhancements to ViPR SRM also include enhanced virtual storage management through the ViPR console. SAS 9.3 boasts integration with VMware NSX, providing deep visibility into compute and network infrastructure in both physical and virtual environments.

ViPR 2.0, available in the second quarter of 2014.

ViPR SRM and SAS 9.3 will be available in Q2.

Laura Dubois, program VP, storage practice, IDC, said: “ViPR is the Software-Defined Storage platform for companies looking to transform their storage infrastructure and gain the value and benefits of the 3rd Platform. The advancements in core capabilities – such as added third party array support, including commodity hardware, along with leading edge geo-replication and geo-distribution features will be necessary for any customer looking to leverage and expand their existing storage infrastructure. ViPR’s self-service storage capabilities reduce human error and provide a very simple, fast and smooth provisioning experience.”

Chris Flaesch, GM, platform offerings, Computer Sciences Corp., said: “With over 177PB of storage under management and a growth rate of 21% per year, EMC’s SRM Suite and EMC ViPR will allow us to improve FTE support ratios of storage by 4 to 5 times.“

Haim Inger, CTO, CLAL Insurance, said: “As we build out our Software-Defined Data Center model, ViPR allows us to go from days to hours, even minutes in order to deploy a new application. Organizationally, ViPR allows us to take apart old silos and give us a portal that specifies specific SLAs to virtual storage pools and deploy them in a much easier way than done previously. It’s just point, click and everything is automated.“

Amitabh Srivastava, president, EMC advanced software division, said: “ViPR is the cornerstone of EMC’s Software-Defined Storage portfolio, it has been designed from the ground up to address the key pain points of EMC’s enterprise and service provider customers today, and into the future. ViPR has been shown to reduce the overhead of managing multi-vendor storage environments by up to 80% and with this new release offers significant improvements in terms of automation, supported platforms and geo-scalability. We continue to respond to customer feedback which has resulted in the inclusion of support for the ECS Appliance, commodity platforms and state-of-the-art object capabilities.”