Backup & Archive

Backup and Archive

The article for this week is entitled “A Novel Approach to Automated, Secure, Reliable, & Distributed Backup of MER Tactical Data on Clouds.” This article was very interesting and gave plenty of factual information on backup and archive data. The table of contents of this article include: introduction, cloud computing for backup storage, methodology, results, interpretations, conclusions, recommendations, acknowledgements, references, and biographies. All of these headings have important information with regard to the topic.

            This article is based around the 2010 MER project, which stands for Mars Exploration Rover. This was the first NASA mission to include a public cloud into its daily mission-critical operations. This switch allowed the availability of one hundred percent of save data, search data, and retrieval of data. The public cloud operation also allowed cost savings, durability, and reliability. “The Operations Storage System (OSS) on MER currently contains 21 TB of data, which includes both uplink and downlink data,” as mentioned in the article. This is a lot of storage space to save plenty of data. Future steps for the MER’s cloud journey is to incorporate new generation storage solutions into data backup and retention strategies. Data that is uploaded is never introduced to the key into the cloud environment due to the novel encryption techniques used by NASA.

            This was a well written article that shared a lot of information on the cloud data storage process of the 2010 Mars Rover Project. It is interesting how new technologies are being used every day and in missions such as this one. 

Storage Companies

Data storage technology consists of computer components and recording media used to retain digital data. It is the core function and fundamental component of computers. Most companies today rely on the use of data storage technology for a variety of reasons. It is important that these storage devices work efficiently. Without a significant amount of memory, a computer would merely be able to perform fixed operations and immediately output the result.

Storage technologies at all levels of the storage hierarchy can be differentiated by evaluating certain core characteristics as well as measuring characteristics specific to a particular implementation. These core characteristics are volatility, mutability, accessibility, and addressability. For any particular implementation of any storage technology, the characteristics worth measuring are capacity and performance.

According to StorageNewsletter.com, the top twelve storage companies in 2013 were: EMC, WD, Seagate, Micron, NetApp, SanDisk, IBM, HDS, HP, Symantec, LSI, and Dell. This website also states that “global revenue of Top 12 Storage Companies increased 5 percent from 2012 to 2013, compared to 10 percent from 2011 to 2012.” Right away a few of these companies stand out to me, such as EMC, SanDisk, IBM, HP, and Dell. These few companies stand out to me because of something that I may have read about them or if I have seen some of their products in local stores.

Companies such as IBM sell many products but their data storage products include: Disk systems, flash systems, tape systems, storage software, and network attached storage. These products have many different features and handle mostly all of your data storage needs. Pretty much any data storage technology need that you have can be easily addressed by many of these products and services. 

Fast & Furious 7

On April 3rd, 2015 the 7th edition to the Fast & Furious movie series will be released. I honestly can't wait to see this film. This movie series is one of my all time favorites. The Fast & Furious movies showcase modified cars, action, and a great storyline that has entertained me and also kept my attention since the very first film. 

     Fast & Furious 7 was written by Chris Morgan and directed by James Wan. This movie stars Vin Diesal, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, Lucus Black and Jason Statham. This movie showcases the events happening after The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift. The trailer leaves the audience in suspense with its action packed events. 

     This movies series has never disappointed me and I look forward to watching this one. A downside to this movie is that it will have the final appearance of Paul Walker due to his death on November 30, 2013. In my opinion this could be the last Fast & Furious movie because of that event. I hope that it won't be the last of the film series but things won't be the same without Walker. I can not wait to be in theaters on April 3rd to watch this movie.