Introduction
Late last year, I took over the Product Marketing Manager role for our BlueXP Mobility services. Over these six months, the most common question I receive has been whether BlueXP tiering is exclusively for the cloud. Given the service was previously called Cloud Tiering, I can understand the confusion. Plus, many customers believe that their on-premises systems can only be managed through their built-in management software, which for ONTAP systems, includes cold data tiering.
This isn’t the case, so I thought I would dig into this question and the others that have come up.
Tier all your cold data
NetApp's BlueXP tiering is not limited to cloud environments. It is a comprehensive data management solution that can be utilized both on-premises and in the cloud. The data source can be from an on-premises AFF/FAS systems. The cold data can be tiered to your preferred object storage, which can either be an on-premises system (StorageGRID or ONTAP S3) or a cloud storage (Amazon S3, Azure blob, and Google Cloud Storage). From on-prem or cloud, to on-prem or cloud, BlueXP tiering will work for your environment.
It’s easier than you think
The next question I am asked is if it is hard to set up. People assume it must be complicated to figure out what data is cold and what to do with it. But this is just another misconception.
BlueXP tiering is quite straightforward and effortless to set up. Customers can utilize pre-defined policies that are designed to address specific use cases. They can opt to tier cold user data and snapshots, which is primary storage tiering, or all user data, which is secondary storage tiering. Additionally, customers looking for a little more control can use the guided workflow to create custom policies that cater to their specific needs.
When cold becomes hot
The third most frequent misconception pertains to tiered data becoming “hot” again and requiring immediate access They want to know how they access this data once it has been tiered to object storage, and if "un-tiering" the data would require a significant amount of effort.
Once again, these concerns are easily dismissed. Whenever there is a requirement for cold data, BlueXP tiering automatically transfers it back to the primary storage.
It is also worth noting that customers always have full visibility to their cold data. Using the BlueXP interface, you gain access to all tiered instances and environments.
Conclusion
In summary, BlueXP tiering is not limited to cloud environments and can be used for both on-premises and cloud systems. Customers can use predefined policies or customized policies to fit specific needs. Retrieving cold data that has been tiered is made easy with an automatic movement back to primary storage. And all of this can be done through ease-to-navigate BlueXP interface. Don't let misconceptions hold you back from utilizing the benefits of BlueXP tiering for efficient data management. NetApp’s BlueXP tiering is designed specifically to help you optimize storage capacity, simplify IT operations, and reduce costs. You can save up your storage total cost of ownership significantly.
To learn more about BlueXP tiering, visit these links: