The VAST innovation engine continues to add value upon the VAST Data Platform with our newest software update, version 3.6. VASTOS v3.6 is another release continuing the version 3 theme: “enterprise feature build-out”. The anchor deliverable for this release is a feature that customers have been waiting on for some time… native replication.

VAST Replication is shipping today, and complements VAST Data’s snap-to-object functionality to provide customers with an alternative, low-RPO approach to protecting their data off-site. With native replication, any VAST cluster can replicate to any other VAST cluster and failover/failback is both instantaneous and seamless. Here’s what you need to know about VAST’s new native replication offering.

• No Overhead Snapshots and Replication

  VAST’s write-in-free space storage architecture is well-suited for high-performance snapshots because all writes are tracked as part of a global counter and the system can easily maintain new and old/invalid state at the same time. Snapshots are taken without the need for copying data or metadata, and replication jobs can easily be shipped across any of the cluster nodes without compromising cluster performance.

• Incredibly Low RPOs

  VAST systems only replicate byte-range deltas using fine grained counters. Replication jobs are performed in intervals of less than one minute… and while the solution is not synchronous, it’s pretty darn close 😀

• Directory-Level Granularity

  Users can replicate data with the granularity they choose.

• S3 Backups and Replication Jobs Are Not Mutually Exclusive

  VAST data protection policies offer users with several choices on how to protect their data such that they can chose to implement any 3 options:

1. VAST ⇋ VAST

One VAST cluster replicates data to a read-only volume of another VAST cluster. Failover and failback are instantaneous.

2. VAST ⇋ Cloud

One VAST cluster replicates read-only snapshots to a S3 endpoint of a customer’s choosing. Data is recoverable from S3 with file/object-level granularity either from an active VAST cluster or from a remote VM called the “reader”.

3. VAST ⇋ VAST ⇋ Cloud

Here, both approaches combine in a solution that provides the maximum level of data protection and recoverability. Data services can immediately be failed over to another VAST cluster or data can be recovered via a remote S3 storage system.

VAST Replication continues the drumbeat of the VAST R&D team where we continue to deliver major innovations that extend the utility, usability, resilience and value of the VAST Data Platform. VAST R&D team is growing quickly and is already positioned as one of the largest storage software development teams in the world. In the coming months, we will be accelerating our pace of innovation as we build out our enterprise capability and help customers make the leap from legacy scale-out solutions and the tradeoffs they impose on data intensive applications.

4.0 is just around the corner. Stay tuned for more updates in just a few weeks! In the meantime, if you need help choosing the right storage for your modern workloads, download our File System Comparison white paper.

Best, Jeff