EMC’s Nile Makes the Leap from Project to Product

EMC Nile logoEMC’s “Project Nile” was first revealed at EMC’s MegaLaunch event in 2013. The idea was hyper-scale private cloud storage at a cost-per-gigabyte similar to (or lower than) public cloud storage.

The idea was to provide this storage via software running on commodity storage hardware.

It was clear from the beginning that EMC intended Nile to be disruptive and a game-changer. Continue reading

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EMC Announces Major Updates to Their SDS Platform – ViPR 2.0

EMC ViPR logoIn another of their announcements on the first day of EMC World, EMC announced a series of major updates and new features for their software-defined storage (SDS) platform, ViPR. The new updates will be in ViPR 2.0

While storage solutions will always require that hardware be involved, software-defined storage allows the ability to provide storage services without being tied to any specific hardware.

ViPR works by separating the control plane from the data plane. This means ViPR come in two parts, ViPR Controller, and ViPR Services. ViPR 2.0 makes additions on both sides. Continue reading

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EMC Announces Version 1.30 of ScaleIO

EMC ScaleIOToday, in one of the many announcements that kicked off EMC World, EMC announced the new version of their ScaleIO product.

If you’re not familiar with ScaleIO, EMC defines it as a “software-only server-based SAN that converges storage and compute resources to form a single-layer, enterprise-grade storage product. You can also think of it as similar to VMware VSAN, but usable for things other than VMware.

What That Means Continue reading

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EMC Announces Addition to the Data Domain Family, the DD2200

Data Domain Model DD2200Today, in one of the product announcements made on the opening day of EMC World, EMC announced an addition to their Data Domain line of purpose-built backup appliances, the model DD2200.

DD2200’s Place in the Data Domain Line

Unlike the VNXe3200 announced last week as a replacement model, the DD2200 is a brand-new addition to the Data Domain Line. It fits right in the middle of what EMC considers their Small enterprise models, being a step up from the DD160, but not quite as big as the DD2500. Continue reading

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EMC’s Project Liberty – Hints of Things to Come?

EMC Project LibertyToday, in addition to announcing a new model VNXe, EMC announced their Project Liberty as part of the pre-EMC World build-up.

What’s Project Liberty? EMC is calling it a “virtualized storage software technology based on VNX”.

What does that mean? Project Liberty is essentially a virtual appliance version of EMC’s VNX.

But, wait, I can hear you thinking this one:

Doesn’t EMC already make a VNX virtual appliance available? Continue reading

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EMC Announces New VNXe Model – A Complete Makeover

VNXe3200Today, as part of the build-up to the flurry of announcements that will come at EMC World,  EMC announced a new addition to their entry-level storage line. The new addition has all of the ease-of-use features that VNXe customers are used to (and enhances them), and adds a number of enterprise-level features that were previously unavailable in the VNXe line.

The new model, the VNXe3200, replaces the VNXe3150. Below, I walk through the features of the 3200 that (in my opinion) really stand out. Continue reading

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More Heartbleed Protection: Update VMware Horizon View Client on Your Mobile Devices

The industry is still cleaning up following the news about the Heartbleed bug in OpenSSL. VMware has released updated versions of the Horizon View Client for both Android and iOS.

The easiest way to ensure you’re safe from the Heartbleed vulnerability is to check to see if there’s an update to the View Client available for your device, and if there is, install it. You can do this on Android by going to the Google Play Store and then selecting “My Apps”. On iOS, go to the App Store and select “Updates”.

If you want to be sure, here are instructions for confirming that you’re running a “Heartbleed-safe” version of the client. Continue reading

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Update OpenSSL on Isilon InsightIQ – Avoid the Heartbleed Vulnerability

[Instructions found herein are based upon the work of multiple other folks in this thread in the Isilon Support Forum.]

By now, you’re likely aware of the “Heartbleed” security vulnerability in the OpenSSL cryptography library. If you have an Isilon cluster, you might be wondering if it’s affected. The good news is that all versions of OneFS are Heartbleed-free.

However, if you’re also running the InsightIQ monitoring software, it might be vulnerable, depending on the version. Here’s what you need to know to find out if your cluster is affected — and what to do about it if it is. Continue reading

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VMware Announces List of 2014 vExperts

VMware vExpert 2014Earlier this week VMware released the list of 2014 vExperts. The community recognition program has grown since its start in 2009, with 754 vExperts being named this year — the largest group yet.

I’m simultaneously proud and humbled to have been included in that list for my third year in a row. Looking over this year’s list I see a lot of heavy-hitters and folks I’ve come to respect for their knowledge and willingness to share what they’ve learned. It’s both an honor to be considered to be in the same group with them as well as a little scary in that humbling “wow-I’m-going-to-have-to-work-hard-to-keep-up” kind of way.

One of the things that I really like about the vExpert program is that it recognizes activity over expertise. Continue reading

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EMC World 2014 Discount Giveaway (limited quantities)!

EMC World, EMC’s annual big-deal conference is coming up 5-8 May in Las Vegas.

As a side-benefit of the EMC Elect program, I have a (small) number of discount codes, worth $150 off the registration price, to give away.

Thanks to the generosity of my fellow EMC Elect members Ian Anderson, Hrvoje Crvelin, Adam Eckerle, Jonathan Frappier, and Damian Karlson, I currently have a total of 16 discount codes to give away. Continue reading

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