Sun Microsystems Announces Sun StorEdge Instant Image Software
Sun Microsystems, Inc. announced Sun StorEdge Instant Image software, a data storage breakthrough that allows Sun Enterprise server customers to perform backups, instant data recovery, test and development, and data warehouse loading without impacting 7x24 operations. This announcement advances the Sun datacenter.com Initiative, which focuses on delivering the continuous availability and predictable performance required by enterprise customers to achieve their business goals.
"Sun StorEdge Instant Image software is an important technology because it eliminates the need to take your business offline to perform time consuming tasks such as backups," said Jeff Allen, Vice President of Marketing for Sun Network Storage. "Sun StorEdge Instant Image software enables business support applications to run against an instant, point-in-time image of data. Because the software enables timely and efficient updates of changed data, it allows backups to occur frequently, significantly reducing a company's time to recovery in cases where data needs to be restored from a backup."
Sun StorEdge Instant Image software enables non-stop availability of enterprise applications such as OLTP, data warehousing, Internet, ERP and customer care by allowing backups and other business-critical processing activities to be performed at any time without disruption to the online application. Prior to Sun StorEdge Instant Image software, for example, enterprise applications were forced to shut down for several hours during routine system backups.
Sun StorEdge Instant Image software improves the performance and availability of applications by providing a point-in-time snapshot of data that can be accessed in parallel by other processing activities. This point-in-time image can be located on the same storage subsystem as the master, or on any other storage subsystem that is connected to a Sun Enterprise server running Sun StorEdge Instant Image software. The differences between the master data and the point-in-time data are then tracked by the software to enable an instant update, or resynchronization, of data without performing an expensive and time-consuming disk-to-disk copy.
Sun StorEdge Instant Image software benefits several business-critical processing activities including:
Backups -- Business continuity and disaster prevention require regular system backups, but traditional backups force network downtime that often lasts hours. Now, with a Sun StorEdge Instant Image point-in-time snapshot of the online data, customers experience maximum system uptime since backups can occur anytime while their business continues to run.
Instant Data Recovery -- Because Sun StoreEdge Instant Image software enables customers to perform frequent snapshots of data without impacting data availability, data is more up-to-date if it needs to be restored. And with point-in-time technology, most data can be restored in minutes rather than hours, significantly reducing the time-to-recovery for 7x24 business operations.
Application Development and Testing -- In traditional development and test environments, a subset of the production data is used for testing new products or upgrades. This does not allow complete product testing prior to going live on the production system, often resulting in longer test cycles or partial test coverage. By testing against a snapshot of the entire production system, the integrity of any given change can be more fully verified, and the time to market for new products and upgrades can be reduced.
Data Warehouse Loading -- Data warehouses need to include timely information as well as historical data, yet updating the warehouse can have a significant impact to users on the online system. Sun StorEdge Instant Image software eliminates the disruption of online data processing by populating a data warehouse from a snapshot image of online data. Because the software leaves online data available, data warehouses can be updated more frequently, thereby providing more timely information for decision making.
Sun StorEdge Instant Image software is expected to be one of the first intelligent storage management products to be compatible with the Jiro platform, a Java technology-based development and deployment environment for management solutions. The specification, which began development in December, 1998, is supported by over 30 storage hardware and software vendors. The Jiro platform enables interoperability and automation of management services for devices and applications on a network, thereby freeing developers to focus on functionality as opposed to interoperability.
Sun StorEdge Instant Image software is currently available through direct and indirect channels. The software supports a wide range of Sun Enterprise servers and Sun StorEdge systems. Pricing for the Sun StorEdge Instant Image software license, which includes complete CD-ROM media and documentation, ranges from $3,000 for the Sun Enterprise 250 and Sun Enterprise 450 server platforms to $50,000 for the Sun Enterprise 10000 server. Installation services are also available.
Sun can be found in more than 150 countries and on the World Wide Web at http://www.sun.com.