Great summary of the difference between block & object storage, thanks Glen! Nate
On Thu, Apr 18, 2013 at 4:24 PM, My Tours <glen at mytoursapp.com> wrote: > >> > >> We are planning to use a cloud service to store large numbers of hi-res > digital images for an online education platform. If any of you already use > cloud services I'd be very grateful for recommendations or advice about > what to look out for. > >> > >> Thank you, as always. > > snip, snip, snip? > > Background: Along with running My Tours where we store images and audio > clips on S3 I also work for Realestate.co.nz where we store ~1.4TB of > images and serve around 80GB of images a day to consumers. This is > currently stored on block storage at a local 'cloudy' provider. We are > currently in the process of selecting a vendor for cloud file storage and > at the moment Amazon s3 with a Fastly CDN is our preferred option. > > On 19/04/2013, at 12:00 AM, mcn-l-request at mcn.edu wrote: > > > > We use Rackspace. They have a new part to their cloud offer, which I've > not yet tried but which sounds helpful if you have large storage needs > because it lets you buy what you need without scaling up the server as a > whole. Cloud Blocks, I think it's called. Ah yes, here it is: > > > > > http://www.rackspace.com/knowledge_center/article/cloud-block-storage-overview > > You have 2 basic types of cloud storage, object storage and block storage. > Block storage is similar to your normal hard disks you would find in your > computer or server. They 'look' just like a regular disk and perform the > same. They tend to be faster than object storage and fit into traditional > apps just like a normal disk would. > > Object storage is aimed at storing a large number of objects (images, > audio, backups, and other assets). It is not a traditional file system in > that you don't just copy files to a folder but use an API to put, requests > and delete files. > > Both types of storage can scale but object based storage (Cloud Files from > Rackspace and s3 from Amazon) is the right approach to storing large > numbers of hi-res images. > > Another type of storage that may be also be of interest is Amazon's > Glacier storage. For long term archival the price comes down to 1c/GB a > month and is a great replacement for tape backups and long term storage > that doesn't need to be accessed a lot. > > Amazon also hooks into a lot of other services such as the Amazon storage > gateway - http://aws.amazon.com/storagegateway/). Worth looking at > depending on your needs. > > And also don't forget a CDN - This helps deliver the assets out to the > users as quickly as possible (s3 can be a little slow if you need fast > access to the assets). Again Amazon makes it easy with CloudFront although > in NZ we're looking at Fastly which has a local point of presence and has a > really nice interface. > > > > > We're using S3 for our collections images with a security policy to > reserve > > the full-size versions. It wasn't a very researched decision except that > we > > were already using AWS and like it. I'd be curious to hear from anyone > who > > did more research and went another direction...? > > > > Nate > > I came out with Amazon as the top contender. Rackspace Cloud Files is a > close second but I'm not sure they do signed requests for access to certain > files. > > > > > We use Azure for one project with a few thousand images. We took a close > look at the charges for additions to the store as well as traffic charges - > hosting the data is just one part of the cost. It worked for us, and has > been reliable, but you need to do your sums. > > > > Azure - Good point. We didn't look at Azure purely because most of our > services are in a Linux environment. If you are Windows then this might be > a good option. (Blob Storage - > http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/home/features/data-management/) > > Feel free to ping me off list if you want to go into anything further - > Happy to chat - glen at mytoursapp.com. > > > > _______________________________________________ > You are currently subscribed to mcn-l, the listserv of the Museum Computer > Network (http://www.mcn.edu) > > To post to this list, send messages to: mcn-l at mcn.edu > > To unsubscribe or change mcn-l delivery options visit: > http://mcn.edu/mailman/listinfo/mcn-l > > The MCN-L archives can be found at: > http://toronto.mediatrope.com/pipermail/mcn-l/ > -- Nate Solas Sr. New Media Developer and Head Technologist Walker Art Center 1750 Hennepin Ave MInneapolis, MN 55407 http://www.walkerart.org/
