It would be fine if that were all there was to the announcement. But IBM has added some pizazz by delivering some new capabilities that differentiate its LTO offerings. To an analyst, hearing about something really new, not just improved feeds and speeds, in a tape technology announcement is unexpected and when combined with the fact that the new capabilities are very useful, that makes it exciting (at least for this analyst).
The LTO Ultrium format specifications include a new feature called media partitioning. IBM is introducing the IBM Long Term File System, which will utilize media partitioning. Now, on the surface, those don't sound exciting, but bear with me. Media partitioning takes advantage of an LTO specification that permits cartridges to support two media partitions. One partition can hold the content, and the other partition can hold the content's index which can make an enabled tape self-describing. Self-describing means that all the information needed to determine what is on a tape is contained within the tape, removing the need for a proprietary application to determine the tape's contents. The IBM Long Term File System allows the viewing and access of tape files in a fashion similar to disk or other removable media. The system can mount a tape as if it were a hard drive. It takes advantage of the self-describing tape, with its index partition and its data partition, that enables a hierarchical directory structure and contains file names, file properties, metadata files, faster search indexes, and domain-specific information.
So why is this so important? A lot of fixed content data does not require instant access, such as in transaction processing systems, but does require reasonably fast recovery. If tape can act for all essential purposes as if it were disk, the cost advantages of using tape over disk open up a whole range of opportunities for tape vendors and solutions. That includes video archiving, medical imaging, and eDiscovery requirements. Accessing data that may need a very long retention period through a tape file system using a file browser without application dependency should prove to be very useful. And so that is why it is exciting.
High technology can and typically does initially evolve in a revolutionary fashion. After the first generation of a new product however, the advances tend to be evolutionary. As demonstrated by the newest generation of LTO, that is fine. Ultrium 5 technology offers some very positive benefits, such as reducing the number of cartridges used and improving backup solutions through larger capacity and faster throughput. So congratulations are in order.
But as the saying goes, IBM does "all of this and more." The introduction of media partitioning and a long-term file system, which enables tape to be used as if it were disk, is very practical. That ability to use tape as disk means that tape, in addition to its traditional support of backup and restore, as well as long-term deep archiving processes, can now dynamically enhance its role in active and long-term archiving. As such, it can support very infrequently accessed data that has a long retention life but has to be recovered relatively quickly on demand, as well as provide the means for the bulk archiving of large files more cost effectively stored on tape. All in all, IBM's new differentiating capabilities add a real punch to its new LTO 5 solutions announcement. Disclosure: At the time that this story was published, David Hill of the Mesabi Group is doing business with IBM.
