Elizabeth M. Ferrarini

Your organization’s growth might require changes in data backup and recovery management techniques, especially if existing hardware and networking schemes have expanded or be redefined. The best management plans handle data coherently across the entire system. The worst approach, and the most costly to the bottom line, provides for trying to manage data on a […]

Trade press articles might have you believing that virtualization tops the list of SAN killer apps. Paul Massiglia, co-author of Storage Area Networks – A Complete Guide to Understanding and Implementing SANS (Veritas Series by John Wiley & Sons) says, “Backup is the number one SAN killer app in my book.” Massiglia knows what he’s […]

If you want to learn about SANs, NAS devices, I-SCSI and InfiniBand, you do far worse than reading the second edition of Marc Farley’s tome — Building Storage Networks (McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media). In fact, the Storage Networking Industry Association recommends Farley’s book as a “must-read for anyone considering designing and carrying out storage networks.” Free of […]

Content management systems need robust storage management. These systems rely on complex databases and must store metadata, usage statistics, user data, and the content itself. Each type of data has different storage requirements. Many of the Web-based content management systems don’t offer storage management simply because bandwidth is very plentiful, and because storage has become […]

Storage area networks (SANs) have rapidly become a major component of enterprise computing. The idea of putting storage systems on their own network offers flexibility, scalability and rapid shared access to large hierarchical arrays. Analysts currently predict a SAN market of $11 billion by 2002, up from virtually nothing in 1999. Surveys show that managers […]

In Part 1, we began a checklist to help key individuals in your organization prepare a recovery plan in case of earthquake, significant power outage, or other disaster. The objective is to restore all critical business functions, rather than just such disparate functions as the data center. Part 1 focused on gathering information in advance, […]

In 1992 Hurricane Andrew put 39 major data centers out of commission. And in 1993 the World Trade Center bombing caused 21 data centers to shut down. While you don’t like to think about it, every organization, regardless of its size, runs the risk of a major systems outage, such as a tornado demolishing a […]