Featured Article(s)
System Life cycle of Computer Based Information System (CBIS)
A computer based information system (CBIS) is a set of software packages, which when executed, provides information for decision- making. Designing and developing a CBIS is one of the most important activities in any organization, as it involves people at different levels in the organization, like any living organism, CBIS also has a life cycle.This Life cycle is explained here.
Almost Like Having a Backup Specialist on Staff
(and a Restore Expert too) – I don’t know if you’ve seen the work Acronis has been doing to make the setup and management of your systems a snap, but they’ve really been working hard to make it easy, straightforward and comprehensive. You can point their wizard at your systems and it’ll even create a backup and recovery plan you can show your management to confirm all is covered and ready to recover. Easy restore, easy backup, comprehensive coverage. Check it out here.
Data Storage – Revisited
I’ve been reading more and more about split-storage solutions (my term, not theirs). Basically, these types of systems where you move data from your primary transactional systems to the web (sorry, the CLOUD) and store information there that you can use for reporting, secondary queries like analysis and the like. This offloads many of the storage requirements of your local systems to these online services, but has many of the drawbacks we’ve beaten to death (er, I mean discussed) here.
It does seem like a viable option, but I wonder. How will these types of systems get real about their storage capabilities? By "get real" I mean a couple of different things. First, there’s the aspect of providing really performant access to data stored in the cloud. This, combined with data security and meaningful management and controls will be a big barrier, especially once you move from SMB-type solutions to larger implementations. The dynamics of managing access in a larger environment pose some interesting challenges. You’ll pretty much have to have fully integrated security with your network systems – from Active Directory to simple user management – to support a larger environment.
But… the thing that I’ve been wondering about most is capacity. There was an article in NetworkWorld about data storage and the cloud where they were talking about the quantity of information generated and stored these days. By 2011, they’re predicting 2T GB. That’s a bunch. (Technical term there, "Bunch") 10x over 2006 – and growing. If we’re looking at storing this type of volume in the cloud, it starts to present capacity issues not only at the storage level, but a the bandwidth level. They’re complaining already about video on the ‘net and how it’s a bandwidth hog. Imagine what happens if reporting and querying is happening in the cloud – from a LOT of organizations. That’s a lot of storage and lots of bandwidth to access it.
Here’s a link to the article – should be interesting to watch. I think we may almost be headed back to mainframe-type processing in the cloud – at least that way you’re not exchanging data over the ‘net so you can process it – you could keep the information flow (the bandwidth hit) to a lower roar if it was results only.
New Video Show Posted
SelectViews #110: Partitioning Large Databases, USB Devices, Performance and Clustered Indexes, Upcoming Events. Also, the Accidental DBA Tip, the 60-Second SQL Server Tip of the Day and a Lot More.
[Watch The Show]
Featured White Paper(s)
Whole Server Protection from a Single Solution
The complexity of traditional recovery solutions compounds an already difficult situation, and heightens the opportunity for … (read more)
BitLocker: Is It Really Secure?
What is BitLocker? How does it work? Is it a truly safe way to protect your data and applications, hard drive, and operation … (read more)