The Ocarina ECOsystem for OEMs

End-to-End Optimization Represents the Future of Dedupe
The Ocarina ECOsystem for OEMs is a software solution specifically designed for embedding with OEM storage products, giving major storage OEMs the ability to deliver the world's most effective data-reduction technology to new and existing customers. The ECOsystem for OEMs supports End-to-End Optimization (E2EO) that leverages a standard dedupe framework across all layers of the data infrastructure from server direct-attach storage, to NAS, to archival, to backup. E2EO allows data to remain in compressed and deduped form throughout it's lifecycle, expanding the value of data reduction beyond simply storage cost savings. OEMs delivering the E2EO data-reduction concept will deliver premium value from customer workflow improvements, data-reliability improvements, and improved network utilization.

ECOsystem for OEMs
The OEM version of the Ocarina ECOsystem is a software-only offering, available to manufacturers who design, build and sell storage products. The ECOsystem for OEM’s can be implemented as a post-process, an in-band process, or a hybrid data-reduction process where some algorithms are applied in-band and some as a post-process. Ocarina has developed a set of ECOsystem API’s designed to make it fast and straightforward for a storage OEM to integrate the ECOsystem transparently as a set of features within their storage product. Currently, the ECOsystem for OEM’s has an API and a SDK for embedding Ocarina in the following six general classes of storage:

Storage Tier	ECOsystem Integration Model
NAS	Ocarina is embedded in the NAS head, provided transparent dedupe and content-aware compression
Block	Ocarina is embedded in Fibre Channel or iSCSI block storage arrays to provide block-aligned dedupe
Cloud	Ocarina has a client-side agent that communicates with the backend cloud to optimize both storage and data transmission
Backup	Ocarina can be integrated directly with OEM hardware to create a scalable backup solution with global dedupe and scale-out clustering
Server	Ocarina is integrated with server operating systems and file systems to provide dedupe and compression for local direct-attach disk. Support is available for Linux, Windows, and popular hypervisors
Archive	Ocarina is integrated with object and long-term archive solutions, with checksum verification, WORM, and other compliance features.

Vendors can choose which elements of Ocarina’s ECOsystem make sense for a given target market of a given storage product. For example, on a nearline NAS or archive product, the full Ocarina object delayering, dedupe, and content-aware compression algorithms may be brought to bear to achieve the maximum data reduction. On a primary block storage array, where performance is the key concern, only fast block dedupe and simple compression may be used. On a backup product, inband dedupe and post-process compression may be configured. By having a flexible pipeline of data reduction actions, the ECOsystem allows an OEM to tailor a data reduction system to meet the performance and use-case requirements for a given product. No matter which elements are configured, Ocarina’s platform-neutral storage containers allow data to be moved from any Ocarina-enabled storage platform to any other.

For storage manufacturers looking for best-in-class storage optimization, contact Ocarina for a technical presentation and documentation on Ocarina’s SDK for storage manufacturers.