Random Short Take #88

Posted on 2023-09-11 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #88. This one’s been sitting in my drafts folder for a while. Let’s get random.

This article from John Birmingham on multitasking was great. I’ve frequently found myself thinking that multitasking was going to save me from myself whilst ultimately leading to an early demise.
What fresh Hell is this? El Reg reported a little while ago that Google launched $99 a night Hotel Mountain View for hybrid workers. It’s rough out there kids, and this might be your only option. But I hope it isn’t.
The USB-C iPhone won’t clean up Apple’s Lightning mess, and that’s a bit of a shame. But I have a bag of dongles in my bag and I don’t want them to go to waste (again).
Chin-Fah wrote a particularly thoughtful article on Open Source Storage and Data Responsibility that made for some great reading.
Backblaze has updated its article “What’s the Diff: Hot and Cold Data Storage“. Very much worth checking out if you’re new to this stuff.
I loves me some data protection, but rest assured that the current market isn’t your father’s data protection market. B&F reports on Gartner seeing shifting players in enterprise backup.
Speaking of data protection, Preston de Guise does a great job talking about what’s new with PowerProtect Data Manager 19.14.
Been wondering if your media streaming experience is really all that it could be? Are discs really better than streaming? I don’t think they are, but I’m often too lazy to get up and put the disc in the player.

Random Short Take #87

Posted on 2023-07-14 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #87. Happy Fête Nationale du 14 juillet to those who celebrate. Let’s get random.

I always enjoy it when tech vendors give you a little peak behind the curtain, and Dropbox excels at this. Here is a great article on how Dropbox selects data centre sites. Not every company is operating at the scale that Dropbox is, but these kinds of articles provide useful insights nonetheless. Even if you just skip to the end and follow this process when making technology choices:

1. Identify what you need early.
2. Understand what’s being offered.
3. Validate the technical details.
4. Physically verify each proposal.
5. Negotiate.

I haven’t used NetWorker for a while, but if you do, this article from Preston on what’s new in NetWorker 19.9 should be of use to you.
In VMware Cloud on AWS news, vCenter Federation for VMware Cloud on AWS is now live. You can read all about it here.
Familiar with Write Once, Read Many (WORM) storage? This article from the good folks at Datadobi on WORM retention made for some interesting reading. In short, keeping everything for ever is really a data management strategy, and it could cost you.
Speaking of data management, check out this article from Chin-Fah on data management and ransomware – it’s an alternative view very much worth considering.
Mellor wrote an article on Pixar and VAST Data’s collaboration. And he did one on DreamWorks and NetApp for good measure. I’m fascinated by media creation in general, and it’s always interesting to see what the big shops are using as part of their infrastructure toolkit.
JB put out a short piece highlighting some AI-related content shenanigans over at Gizmodo. The best part was the quoted reactions from staff – “16 thumbs down emoji, 11 wastebasket emoji, six clown emoji, two face palm emoji and two poop emoji.”
Finally, the recent Royal Commission into the “Robodebt” program completed and released a report outlining just how bad it really was. You can read Simon’s coverage over at El Reg. It’s these kinds of things that make you want to shake people when they come up with ideas that are destined to cause pain.

Random Short Take #86

Posted on 2023-06-01 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #86. It’s been a while, and I’ve been travelling a bit for work. So let’s get random.

Let’s get started with three things / people I like: Gestalt IT, Justin Warren, and Pure Storage. This article by Justin digs into some of the innovation we’re seeing from Pure Storage. Speaking of Justin, if you don’t subscribe to his newsletter “The Crux”, you should. I do. Subscribe here.
And speaking of Pure Storage, a survey was conducted and results were had. You can read more on that here.
Switching gears slightly (but still with a storage focus), check out the latest Backblaze drive stats report here.
Oh you like that storage stuff? What about this article on file synchronisation and security from Chin-Fah?
More storage? What about this review of the vSAN Objects Viewer from Victor?
I’ve dabbled in product management previously, but this article from Frances does a much better job of describing what it’s really like.
Edge means different things to different people, and I found this article from Ben Young to be an excellent intro to the topic.
You know I hate Netflix but love its tech blog. Check out this article on migrating critical traffic at scale.

Bonus round. I’m in the Bay Area briefly next week. If you’re around, let me know! Maybe we can watch one of the NBA Finals games.

Random Short Take #85

Posted on 2023-04-14 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #85. Let’s get random.

I like that Backblaze isn’t just in the business of selling backup and storage in the cloud, but also educating the punters. This article on object storage for film, video, and content creation was great.
It’s about time Alex put pen to paper again (so to speak), and this arrticle on the current state of cloud security was insightful.
My friend Vincent is at it again, and discusses What We Are Talking About When We Talk About Immutable Backup? It’s a great topic, and one that a few vendors gloss over when they talk about how they’re keeping your data safe.
Preston posted a terrific piece on how data hoarding is probably holding your business back. I’m as guilty as most of holding on to information and data for way too long. And most business folks are too.
In press release news, Nyriad is showcasing some interesting stuff at NAB.
William Lam recently took a trip down memory lane and looked at ESX 1.0. He followed that up with installation instructions via video for all of the ESX(i) versions that have been released, and even posted a handy workaround when nested installations weren’t working. Great stuff.
Speaking of old things, El Reg had some info on running (hobbyist) x86-64 editions of OpenVMS. I ran OpenVMS on a DEC Alpha AXP-150 at home for a brief moment, but that feels like it was a long time ago.
This article from JB on the Bowlo was excellent. I don’t understand why Australians are so keen on poker machines (or gambling in general), but it’s nice when businesses go against the grain a bit.

Random Short Take #84

Posted on 2023-03-17 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #84. There’s a bit going on, so let’s get random.

Stephen Wagner published the most excellent NVIDIA vGPU Troubleshooting Guide – How to troubleshoot vGPU on VMware. It’s extremely comprehensive, and worth checking out if you’re doing anything with vGPU on VMware.
Preston did a great job of talking about the difference between Outage vs Outrage. It usually comes down to one letter.
I like Time Machine, and I like the way Howard explains Apple concepts in his blog posts, so this article “How does Time Machine make a backup?” really hit the spot.
My friend Vincent has made it to 100,000 hits on his blog, and I really hope he gets a lot more. He’s a smart chap.
The folks at Backblaze have published their annual Backblaze Drive Stats for 2022 and, not to be outdone by themselves (?), have also published The SSD Edition: 2022 Drive Stats Review.
In press release news, Nyriad and DigitalGlue Partner.
In other news, Asigra unveiled a backup platform to protect the world’s catalog of Software-as-a-Service Applications with SaaSBACKUP℠ Platform. What? You don’t back up your SaaS? You probably should, hey?
In another PR news, Pure Storage recently announced the FlashBlade//E.

Random Short Take #82

Posted on 2023-01-24 by dan

Happy New Year (to those who celebrate). Let’s get random.

Those of you who know me well will know I’m a big fan of Debian. I find running manual apt commands on my various Raspberry Pis therapeutic, but an automated approach is probably better. This is a great article on how to configure automated security updates on Debian automatically.
I miss Tru64, and Solaris for that matter. I don’t miss HP-UX. And I definitely won’t miss AIX. Read about the death of Unix over at El Reg – Unix is dead. Long live Unix!
The I3.metal is going away very soon. Remember this is from a sales perspective, VMware is still supporting the I3.metal in the wild, and you’ll still have access to deploy on-demand if required (up to a point).
I do miss using Rubrik, so I thought this article on how to run a script with 2FA enabled on Rubrik might fill the gap.
You think you have thoughts on online disk archives? Read this piece over at Blocks and Files – Opinion: Online disk archives are just wrong.
Oh VVols – I was just thinking about you recently. So was Alastair, and he even bothered to put some thoughts out there – VVols, Oh VVols, wherefore art thou VVols?
Speaking of VVols, Nicholson also has some thoughts – NFS Native Snapshots, Should I just use vVols instead?
But really, when I think about VVols, I can’t go past my man Cody from Pure Storage. Here’s his piece on multiple vVol datastores on FlashArray.

Random Short Take #81

Posted on 2022-12-15 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #81. Last one for the year, because who really wants to read this stuff over the holiday season? Let’s get random.

Curtis did a podcast on archive and retrieve as part of his “Backup to Basics” series. It’s something I feel pretty strongly about, so much so that I wrote a chapter in his book about it. You can listen to it here.
More William Gibson content is coming to our screens, with the announcement that Neuromancer is coming to Apple TV. I hope it’s as well done as The Peripheral. Hat tip to John Birmingham for posting the news on his blog.
It’s been a while since I looked at Dell storage, but my friend Max wrote a great article over at Gestalt IT on Dell PowerStore.
William Lam’s blog is a veritable fount of knowledge, and this piece on ESXi Advanced & Kernel Settings Reference is great.
I love Backblaze. Not in the sense that I want to marry the company, but I really like what the folks there do. And I really like the transparency with which they operate. This article giving a behind the scenes look at its US East Data Center is a fantastic example of that.
In press release news, DH2i has announced that it’s collaborating with Red Hat to accelerate the delivery of intelligent applications across the multi cloud.
In other press release news, Zerto has been cited as a contender among data resilience solutions suites by an independent research firm.
And, to “celebrate” 81 Random Short Takes (remember when I used to list my favourite NBA players and the numbers they wore?), let’s take a stroll down memory lane with two of my all-time, top 5, favourite NBA players – Kobe Bryant and Jalen Rose. The background for this video is explained by Jalen here.

Take care of yourselves and each other, and I’ll hopefully see you all on the line or in person next year.

Random Short Take #79

Posted on 2022-10-28 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #79. Where did October go? Let’s get random.

A lot of data protection stuff this time around, kicking off with Preston de Guise’s deep dive into Dynamic NAS Protection with PowerProtect Data Manager.
Switching from NAS to cloud, W. Curtis Preston’s latest podcast went into some depth on using public and private cloud and how to protect it.
We’re not done with backup and recovery yet though. This article from Ben Liebowitz on setting up immutable backups for Vembu using S3 was comprehensive.
Rounding out the data protection news, Zerto has published a release saying that organisations don’t have great ransomware recovery strategies but they’re trying to do better. Make of that what you will given some of the latest news in Australia and around the world when it comes to data leaks and attacks.
Tom Hollingsworth wrote a great article on clearing out the cruft in your home – specifically the electronic kind. I have a cupboard full of cables I tell myself I’ll need at some point, but I really need to just get rid of them. In my defence, I did unplug my LaserDisc player last weekend. Baby steps and all that.
I follow Jeff Geerling for his zany antics with hardware, but I also really enjoyed his take on what’s wrong with some of the streaming services (in this case Netflix) we can’t help but feel obliged to shell out for.
Speaking of streaming, this article covered some of the best mechanisms to purchase digital content with. I still prefer buying discs, but I’m a bit weird too.
Finally, I’ve been a fan of John Birmingham’s writing since I was a misspending my youth at university in the 90s, so it makes sense that I’d enjoy his food reviews too (mainly because it’s not just about food). It should come as no surprise that I, too, love pork rillette.

Random Short Take #77

Posted on 2022-09-21 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #77. Spring has sprung. Let’s get random.

I mentioned StorPool’s release 20 in my last Random Short Take, and Chris M. Evans dives in further here.
Tony is back at it again with more posts on NSX, and this one on NSX Edge Transport Nodes with failed deletion makes for some interesting reading.
I (sadly) haven’t touched Rubrik in around a year now, but I couldn’t resist linking to Frederic’s post on Active Directory recovery with Rubrik. Great how-to article as always.
Zerto has announced its Partner of the Year Awards for 2022.
In other press releases of interest, Aparavi has announced it will deliver unstructured data management on Seagate Lyve Cloud.
Speaking of unstructured data and press releases, Datadobi has some good news to share with its latest StorageMAP update.
Folio Photonics recently announced some breakthroughs with multi-layer optical disc storage technology. I can’t do the technology justice, so you should check out what Justin had to say over at Forbes, and Mellor had some thoughts too.
This short, sharp piece from JB is the best. Too often I’ve found myself grinding through a TV show because I had high hopes for it, or so many people told me it was great. What I should have realised is that amateur TV critics (i.e. your friends and colleagues) are often like home theatre enthusiasts who have bought their first subwoofer. Whether it’s good or bad, that’s the choice they made, and they need you to endorse that choice so they can feel better about it as well.

Finally, the blog turned 15 years old recently (about a month ago). I’ve been so busy with the day job that I forgot to appropriately mark the occasion. But I thought we should do something. So if you’d like some stickers (I have some small ones for laptops, and some big ones because I can’t measure things properly), send me your address via this contact form and I’ll send you something as a thank you for reading along.

Random Short Take #76

Posted on 2022-08-31 by dan

Welcome to Random Short Take #76. Summer’s almost here. Let’s get random.

The nice folks at StorPool have announced StorPool Storage v20. I was lucky enough to catch up with Boyan and the team recently, and they told me about their work on supporting NVMe/TCP, StorPool on Amazon AWS, and NFS File Storage. It’s great stuff and worth checking out.
Long term retention – all the kids are doing it, but there are some things you need to think about. Preston has posted a great article on it here.
That Geerling fellow is at it again, this time reviewing 6 Raspberry Pis, 6 SSDs on a Mini ITX Motherboard. Hat tip to my mate Tony for the link.
Speaking of Tony, he’s finally back blogging, with this succinct piece on DHCP with NSX VLAN segments.
Lots going on at VMware Explore 2022 in San Francisco this week. Danny Alvarez has put together a series of links covering the major announcements. I hope to get time to cover the major VMware Cloud on AWS news in the next few weeks.
In press release news, Komprise has achieved a 2022 INC. 5000 Ranking.
I had a chance to catch up with Verge.io, recently and the company has some interesting news to share about shared, virtualized GPU computing.
Zerto recently announced it has joined the AWS ISV Workload Migration Partner Program.
And, finally, Leaseweb has appointed Richard Copeland As CEO of Its U.S. Business.

PenguinPunk.net

I like punk rock and storage arrays

Category Archives: Data Protection

Random Short Take #88

Random Short Take #87

Random Short Take #86

Random Short Take #84

Random Short Take #82

Random Short Take #81

Random Short Take #79

Random Short Take #77

Random Short Take #76

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: