SNIA on Cloud Storage

A Q&A on Data Literacy

October 5, 2020October 5, 2020 Jim Fister Leave a comment

The SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) recently hosted a conversation with Glyn Bowden from HPE that I moderated on “Using Data Literacy to Drive Insight.” In a wide-ranging conversation just over 45 minutes, we had a great discussion on a variety of topics related to ensuring the accuracy of data in order to draw the right conclusions using current examples of data from the COVID-19 pandemic as well as law enforcement. In the process of the dialog, some questions and comments arose, and we’re collecting them in this blog.

Q. So who really needs Data Literacy skills?

A: Really, everyone does. We all make decisions in our daily life, and it helps to understand the provenance of the information being presented. It’s also important to find ways to the source material for the data when necessary in order to make the best decisions. Everyone can benefit from knowing more about data. We all need to interpret the information offered to us by people, press, journals, educators, colleagues, friends.

Q. What’s an example of “everyone” who needs data literacy?

Keeping Up with 5G, IoT and Edge Computing

October 1, 2020October 1, 2020 Michael Hoard Leave a comment

The broad adoption of 5G, Internet of things (IoT) and edge computing will reshape the nature and role of enterprise and cloud storage over the next several years. What building blocks, capabilities and integration methods are needed to make this happen? That will be the topic of discussion at our live SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies webcast on October 21, 2020 “Storage Implications at the Velocity of 5G Streaming.”

Join my SNIA expert colleagues, Steve Adams and Chip Maurer, for a discussion on common questions surrounding this topic, including:

An FAQ on the “Fine Print” of Cyber Insurance

September 30, 2020September 30, 2020 Paul Talbut Leave a comment

Last month, the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative, convened experts, Eric Hibbard and Casey Boggs, for a webcast on cyber insurance – a growing area to further mitigate risks from cyber attacks. However, as our attendees learned, cyber insurance is not as simple as buying a pre-packaged policy. If you missed the live event “Does Your Cyber Insurance Strategy Need a Tune-Up” you can watch it on-demand.

Determining where and how cyber insurance fits in a risk management program generates a lot of questions. Our experts have provided answer sto them all here:

Q. Do “mega” companies buy cyber insurance or do they self-insure?

A. Many Fortune 500 companies do carry cyber insurance. The scope of coverage can vary significantly. Concerns over ransomware are often a driver. Publicly traded companies have a need to meet due care obligations and cyber insurance is a way of demonstrating this.

Q. Insurance companies don’t like to pay out. I suspect making a claim is quite contentious?

AIOps Q&A

September 14, 2020September 14, 2020 J Metz Leave a comment

Last month, the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative was fortunate to have artificial intelligence (AI) expert, Parviz Peiravi, explore the topic of AI Operations (AIOps) at our live webcast, “IT Modernization with AIOps: The Journey.” Parviz explained why the journey to cloud native and microservices, and the complexity that comes along with that, requires a rethinking of enterprise architecture. If you missed the live presentation, it’s now available on demand together with the webcast slides.

We had some interesting questions from our live audience. As promised, here are answers to them all:

Q. Can you please define the Data Lake and how different it is from other data storage models?

The Impact and Implications of Internet of Payments

September 2, 2020September 2, 2020 Jim Fister Leave a comment

Electronic payments, once the purview of a few companies, have expanded to include a variety of financial and technology companies. Internet of Payment (IoP) enables payment processing over many kinds of IoT devices and has also led to the emergence of the micro-transaction. The growth of independent payment services offering e-commerce solutions, such as Square, and the entry of new ways to pay, such as Apple Pay, mean that a variety of devices and technologies also have come into wide use. This is the topic that the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative is going to examine at our live webcast on October 14, 2020 “Technology Implications of Internet of Payments.”

Along with the rise and dispersal of the payment eco-system, more of our assets that we exchange for payment are becoming digitized as well. When digital ownership is equivalent to physical ownership, security and scrutiny of those digital platforms and methods takes a leap forward in significance.

Assets and funds are now widely distributed across multiple organizations. Physical asset ownership is even being shared between many stakeholders resulting in more ownership opportunities for less investment but in a distributed way.

In this webcast we will look at the impact of all of these new principles across multiple use cases and how it impacts not only on the consumers driving this behavior but on the underlying infrastructure that supports and enables it. We’ll examine:

Achieving Data Literacy

August 24, 2020August 24, 2020 Jim Fister Leave a comment

We’re all spending our days living in the pandemic and understanding the cultural changes on a personal level. That keening wail you hear is not some outside siren, it’s you staring out the window at the world that used to be. But with all that, have you thought about the insight that you could be applying to your business?

If the pandemic has taught data professionals one essential thing, it’s this: Data is like water when it escapes; it reaches every aspect of the community it inhabits. This fact becomes apparent when the general public has access to statistics, assessments, analysis and even medical journals related to the pandemic, at a scale never seen before.

But having access to data does not automatically grant the reader knowledge of how to interpret that data or the ability to derive insight. In fact, it can be quite challenging to judge the accuracy or value in that data.

The Role of AIOps in IT Modernization

July 23, 2020July 23, 2020 Alex McDonald Leave a comment

The almost overnight shift of resources toward remote work has introduced the need for far more flexible, dynamic and seamless end-to-end applications, putting us on a path that requires autonomous capabilities using AIOps – Artificial Intelligence for IT Operations.

It’s the topic that the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative is going to cover on August 25, 2020 at our live webcast, “IT Modernization with AIOps: The Journey.” Our AI expert, Parviz Peiravi, will provide an overview of concepts and strategies to accelerate the digitalization of critical enterprise IT resources, and help architects rethink what applications and underlying infrastructure are needed to support an agile, seamless data centric environment. This session will specifically address migration from monolithic to microservices, transition to Cloud Native services, and the platform requirements to help accelerate AIOps application delivery within our dynamic hybrid and multi-cloud world.   

Join this webcast to learn:

Where Does Cyber Insurance Fit in Your Security Strategy?

July 17, 2020July 17, 2020 Paul Talbut Leave a comment

Protection against cyber threats is recognized as a necessary component of an effective risk management approach, typically based on a well-known cybersecurity framework. A growing area to further mitigate risks and provide organizations with the high level of protection they need is cyber insurance. However, it’s not as simple as buying a pre-packaged policy. In fact, it’s critical to identify what risks and conditions are excluded from a cyber insurance policy before you buy.

Determining what kind of cyber insurance your business needs or if the policy you have will really cover you in the event of an incident is challenging. On August 27, 2020 the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) will host a live webcast, “Does Your Storage Need a Cyber Insurance Tune-Up?” where we’ll examine how cyber insurance fits in a risk management program.

We’ll identify key terms and conditions that should be understood and carefully negotiated as cyber insurance policies may not cover all types of losses.

Kubernetes Business Resiliency FAQ

July 13, 2020July 13, 2020 Jim Fister Leave a comment

The SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative continued our webcast series on Kubernetes last month with an interesting look at the business resiliency of Kubernetes. If you missed “A Multi-tenant, Multi-cluster Kubernetes Datapocalypse in Coming” it’s available along with the slide deck in the SNIA Educational Library here. In this Q&A blog, our Kubernetes expert, Paul Burt, answers some frequently asked questions on this topic.

Q: Multi-cloud: Departments might have their own containers; would they have their own cloud (i.e. Hybrid Cloud)? Is that how multi-cloud might start in a company?

A: Multi-cloud or hybrid cloud is absolutely a result of different departments scaling containers in a deployment. Multi-cloud means multiple clusters, but those can be of various configurations. Different clusters and clouds need to be tuned for the needs of the organization.

A Q&A on the Impact of AI

June 15, 2020June 15, 2020 Alex McDonald Leave a comment

It was April Fools’ Day, but the Artificial Intelligence (AI) webcast the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) hosted on April 1^st was no joke! We were fortunate to have AI experts, Glyn Bowden and James Myers, join us for an interesting discussion on the impact AI is having on data strategies. If you missed the live event, you can watch it here on-demand. The audience asked several great questions. Here are our experts’ answers:

Q. How does the performance requirement of the data change from its capture at the edge through to its use