Byte and Switch: Pirus was big on iSCSI. Sun is not a big iSCSI supporter. What's the status of Pirus's iSCSI technology? What will happen to that? [See Sun Says iSCSI May Be a 'Mistake'.]
Napolitano: We're certainly focused on getting to market in a way that generates the most revenue for Sun... So that's Fibre Channel, snapshot, dynamic multipathing, and adding other data services on to that. We will turn back on file system stuff in the future, and we'll turn iSCSI back on when the market is there. I just don't see the market being there. I think the technology adoption of iSCSI is far slower than all the zealots have been purporting for a long time. The proposition of us being protocol- and wire-agnostic is still there... We're not saying, "Death to iSCSI." We're just waiting for the market to develop.
Byte and Switch: So where on the roadmap is iSCSI?
Napolitano: The first place you'll see iSCSI for us is in site-to-site replication. That will be the first incarnation. We're actually trying to get that out this year. But the schedule's tight, I just don't know. There's some ASIC stuff going on. First quarter next year is probably more conservative. But it's not intended to be local to the data center it will be between data centers.
Byte and Switch: Looking back at the history of Pirus, would you have done anything different? Do you have any regrets? You said you voted with your feet.
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