Managing company storage can be a complex and resource-intensive process. What's more demanding is the application of a multi-cloud environment. The complexity of storage management can then increase tenfold. If edge computing also plays a role, managing IT can be a nightmare. From all angles and directions, from all geographies and from all types of devices comes data.
Before entering multi-cloud and edge-storage chaos, CIOs and other IT decision makers must ask several important questions. With data management at the center of storage, data collection, transmission and storage are just a few of the many aspects that need to be considered.
1.Where is the data generated and collected?
In multi-cloud / edge computing storage environments, data can be generated by users, applications, or devices originating from desktops, laptops, smartphones, sensors from the Industrial 4.0 environment, IoT devices, and other systems. In some cases, data is collected near the place where it was made, but often sent to different locations. For example, a sales representative can use the mobile application Send an order to a web application hosted on a cloud service where data is also collected and stored. Conversely, for example, there are manufacturing facilities full of IoT sensors that send their data to the closest edge system that is cached and analyzed in real-time.
2.What type of data is generated and how much?
TI cannot plan storage requirements for multi-cloud / edge environments without knowing the type and amount of data expected. Is the data structured, semi-structured or unstructured? Are there video files, graphic files or word processing files? What is the amount of data per source? The team needs to know how much data and what kind of data will come in the short and long term. They need this information regardless of where the data is generated or collected. It is important to see all events and events that can affect storage needs, such as jumbo files or deduplication processes.
3.Which data is stored for how long?
In many cases, data is collected in the hope that they must be stored indefinitely or at least for a longer period of time. However, in some situations, only a portion of the data needs to be stored for a long time, or data only needs to be stored for a short time. For example, IoT raw data collected on a system edge may only be needed until the necessary analysis has been carried out. Furthermore, raw data can be discarded while maintaining analysis results.
4.Which data is sent and how often?
Not all collected data must be transferred to another platform. In some cases, only a portion of the data needs to be moved, or only data that has been collected, cleaned, or otherwise transformed. It is even possible that no data needs to be moved. That depends on where the data needs to be processed and analyzed after it is collected. The IT department must plan the storage of data collected and transferred. This requires a comprehensive understanding of the type and amount of data to be moved and data to be stored or deleted.
5.When and how often is the data transferred?
The IT department also needs to know when data is transferred and how this transfer is carried out. This flows into the basic planning of transferring data from one platform to another. For example, data must be copied periodically from the data center to the cloud platform or moved from one cloud platform to another. The memory requirements can vary depending on the transmission schedule and the amount of data. The IT department must also consider whether data is transferred between platforms without direction or two directions if storage can be compromised. Of course, the data throughput of the selected transmission line plays an important role in the calculation.
6.Where and how long is the data sent stored?
In multi-cloud / edge computer storage environments, data can be transferred from the edge system to the cloud platform, from the cloud platform to the data center, from the data center to the cloud platform, or a combination of these three areas. IT must have a clear picture of all data flows from each endpoint to each destination. Information about which data is transferred, how much data is available and when the data is transferred, only provides a portion of the overall image. The IT department also needs to understand where data is hosted and how long it stays there, whether on the cloud platform, in a personal data center or elsewhere.
7.How is data managed and stored?
Data management includes moving and storing data. Therefore, the planner must find out which tool is used for data transfer and to what extent the process is automated. You also have to determine how the data movements are organized and how the data is stored. Various tools and processes can have direct and indirect effects on storage. Depending on the nature of the data transformation, staging may be needed to temporarily host data, potentially requiring significant memory. In addition, solutions such as NoSQL data management and data storage systems each have their own storage requirements.
8.How is disaster recovery implemented and practiced?
When planning storage for multi-cloud environments, IT must consider how to implement a disaster recovery strategy (DR). Processes such as backing up data or maintaining excessive data usually add to storage requirements. If teams also need to integrate edge systems into their environment, their DR strategies can become more complicated, especially when the number of edge systems grows. For example, what happens if one of these systems fails? How did failure occur? Where is the workload transferred? Every edge system must have its own DR plan? All of these variables can influence how IT departments plan the storage needed to support effective DR strategies.
9.How are structural changes and workflows taken into account?
Companies adopt a multi-cloud strategy because they increase flexibility while providing greater portability in heterogeneous environments. Adding advanced computing storage systems can endanger flexibility and portability when IT departments don't want to make changes such as adding and removing cloud services, migrating workloads between platforms, or integrating new edge systems to process into structures. To plan storage properly in the long run, IT must understand how to handle edge integration and how to accommodate changing conditions in a multi-cloud / edge environment.
10.What are the security and compliance requirements?
One of the challenges of a multi-cloud environment is ensuring data security and privacy, regardless of where the data is located or how the data is moved. At the same time, because of its inherent flexibility, multi-cloud storage environments can help meet compliance requirements. However, storage for edge computing promises to increase the complexity of this problem. This is especially true when it comes to IoT devices. The IT department must take every precaution to ensure that data cannot be compromised and that the company complies with all of its compliance. Requirements, regardless of where the data is or how to move from one platform to the next.
