Do you know where your datas stored, and how much of that data is actually usable? A growing number of data center administrators dont – and thats a problem. See, as the volume of information stored in the data center grows ever larger, storing all that data becomes a greater and greater challenge.
This complexity needs to be managed – and not just because it reduces efficiency and drives up management costs. It also contributes to downtime. On some level, this makes sense, the more moving parts there are in a system, the likelier it is that something goes wrong.
And when that something is a storage array that hosts mission-critical data, it can be catastrophic.
It isnt just backups contributing to this growing complexity. Business app usage is at an all-time high, and Gartner last year predicted that by the end of 2017, market demand for app development will outstrip development capacity by a ratio of five to one. Consider that mobile devices have never been more prominent in enterprise, and factor in technologies like the cloud, and its no wonder things in the data center are starting to get a little complicated.
Nor is it a surprise that moving forward, ITs role becomes less about controlling systems and more about simplifying them.
How can you do that with data center storage, though? How can you reduce storage complexity in your data center, and improve overall efficiency? Believe it or not, its easier than you might expect:
- Better visibility, better communication: By establishing clear roles for your employees and understanding what services IT is responsible for managing, you can reduce the likelihood of miscommunication. Same thing goes for setting up an easy means of internal communication such as a messaging app.
- Dont just manage backups: As weve already mentioned, your backups are only part of the problem where storage complexity is concerned. Theres a good chance that if your data center is like most, youve got a ton of apps on the go, all generating their own data. Ignore that data at your own peril.
- Govern your information: Establish clear best practices and implement ownership of critical data. Hold employees accountable for keeping their own information organized and simplified.
- Implement thin provisioning: Allocate only the disk space you need for storage – you can always provision more as the need arises.
- Delete useless data: Do you really need those access logs from two years ago? Is it really necessary to keep all that big data without analyzing it? Consider carefully every byte of data you store – theres a good chance that at least some of it is unnecessary.
- Plan the physical facility: Dont underestimate the impact your data centers layout has on complexity – if your floor plan is poorly organized, that can cause just as many problems as fat-provisioned storage.
The above tips are just a brief overview of how you can make your data centers storage less complex. Theres a lot more youll need to do if you truly want to reduce overall complexity. Consider this a starting point – the rest is up to you.