openstack-manuals/doc/training-guides/module003-ch003-obj-store-capabilities.xml
Sean Roberts 7ec78aef2d changes the trunk location for the training guides
was incorrectly placed in trunk/training-guide non-plural, now trunk/training-guides.
also add redirect from trunk/openstack-training and trunk/training-guide to the
new location.

Change-Id: I0648a9604dc6a1d6c7480a90c07871608a8752ca
Closes-Bug: #1255684
2013-11-27 14:41:18 -08:00

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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<chapter xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook"
xmlns:xi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude"
xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"
version="5.0"
xml:id="module003-ch003-obj-store-capabilities">
<title>Object Storage Capabilities</title>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>OpenStack provides redundant, scalable object
storage using clusters of standardized servers capable
of storing petabytes of data</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Object Storage is not a traditional file system, but
rather a distributed storage system for static data
such as virtual machine images, photo storage, email
storage, backups and archives. Having no central
"brain" or master point of control provides greater
scalability, redundancy and durability.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Objects and files are written to multiple disk
drives spread throughout servers in the data center,
with the OpenStack software responsible for ensuring
data replication and integrity across the
cluster.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Storage clusters scale horizontally simply by adding
new servers. Should a server or hard drive fail,
OpenStack replicates its content from other active
nodes to new locations in the cluster. Because
OpenStack uses software logic to ensure data
replication and distribution across different devices,
inexpensive commodity hard drives and servers can be
used in lieu of more expensive equipment.</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<para><guilabel>Swift Characteristics</guilabel></para>
<para>The key characteristics of Swift include:</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>All objects stored in Swift have a URL</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>All objects stored are replicated 3x in
as-unique-as-possible zones, which can be defined as a
group of drives, a node, a rack etc.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>All objects have their own metadata</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Developers interact with the object storage system
through a RESTful HTTP API</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Object data can be located anywhere in the
cluster</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>The cluster scales by adding additional nodes --
without sacrificing performance, which allows a more
cost-effective linear storage expansion vs. fork-lift
upgrades</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Data doesnt have to be migrated to an entirely new
storage system</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>New nodes can be added to the cluster without
downtime</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Failed nodes and disks can be swapped out with no
downtime</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Runs on industry-standard hardware, such as Dell,
HP, Supermicro etc.</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<figure>
<title>Object Storage(Swift)</title>
<mediaobject>
<imageobject>
<imagedata fileref="figures/image39.png"/>
</imageobject>
</mediaobject>
</figure>
<para>Developers can either write directly to the Swift API or use
one of the many client libraries that exist for all popular
programming languages, such as Java, Python, Ruby and C#.
Amazon S3 and RackSpace Cloud Files users should feel very
familiar with Swift. For users who have not used an object
storage system before, it will require a different approach
and mindset than using a traditional filesystem.</para>
</chapter>