DevOps.com

  • Latest
    • Articles
    • Features
    • Most Read
    • News
    • News Releases
  • Topics
    • AI
    • Continuous Delivery
    • Continuous Testing
    • Cloud
    • Culture
    • DataOps
    • DevSecOps
    • Enterprise DevOps
    • Leadership Suite
    • DevOps Practice
    • ROELBOB
    • DevOps Toolbox
    • IT as Code
  • Videos/Podcasts
    • Techstrong.tv Podcast
    • Techstrong.tv - Twitch
    • DevOps Unbound
  • Webinars
    • Upcoming
    • On-Demand Webinars
  • Library
  • Events
    • Upcoming Events
    • On-Demand Events
  • Sponsored Content
  • Related Sites
    • Techstrong Group
    • Container Journal
    • Security Boulevard
    • Techstrong Research
    • DevOps Chat
    • DevOps Dozen
    • DevOps TV
    • Techstrong TV
    • Techstrong.tv Podcast
    • Techstrong.tv - Twitch
  • Media Kit
  • About
  • Sponsor
  • AI
  • Cloud
  • Continuous Delivery
  • Continuous Testing
  • DataOps
  • DevSecOps
  • DevOps Onramp
  • Platform Engineering
  • Low-Code/No-Code
  • IT as Code
  • More
    • Application Performance Management/Monitoring
    • Culture
    • Enterprise DevOps
    • ROELBOB
Hot Topics
  • Grafana Labs Acquires Pyroscope to Add Code Profiling Capability
  • Four Technologies Transforming Data and Driving Change
  • Neural Hashing: The Future of AI-Powered Search
  • How Database DevOps Fuels Digital Transformation
  • Large Organizations Are Embracing AIOps

Home » Blogs » How Dispersed Can We Be?

How Dispersed Can We Be?

Avatar photoBy: Don Macvittie on November 10, 2021 Leave a Comment

It is interesting to consider DevOps from the storage perspective. DevOps in general—and specifically newer development and deployment models—tried to pretend that long-term storage was not a necessary component of software delivery. In short, it appears that because there wasn’t a good answer to long-term state in stateless development models, the storage and databases that used state were hand-waved away. Which, of course, failed. Container deployment models did the same thing and failed just as miserably. Oh, containers didn’t fail, but the attempt to ignore persistent storage did; from the very beginning, it was clear that was going to happen. We were doing early container implementations and working through how to ensure that containers ABC had access to the same shared storage. That need never went away and was never going to. Apps can run without persistence, but business doesn’t run without persistent data.

Checking out the wave of cool new products like, for example, Ionir (disclosure—I know more about them simply because I’m friends with their CMO. Other vendors likely have good solutions, too) makes me realize the answers that we needed were right in front of us. And not just the answer to persistent storage, but to storage portability, which has been a problem from the beginning of the cloud. Data gravity is the idea that data holds apps in place. Tools like Ionir reduce the gravity of data. A lot. They can’t get rid of data gravity, because some platforms charge for data storage, data ingress and egress, etc. but that becomes a TCO operations problem rather than a near-insurmountable tech problem.

But just as interesting is this: What if the slow but steady increase in core Internet speeds will allow us to access data from anywhere? We could do that now, but performant applications struggle if you force them to leave cloud A and go to your data center or to cloud B to get a dataset. Yet we use APIs that do just that on a regular basis. What are Google Maps and Google Places if not simply big old honking databases? And yet we call out to them from just about every platform.

So, it’s worth trying out and seeing if the idea of data gravity is maybe an obsolete idea for you. For some applications that really do need super-fast response times, the concept is still relevant. But for many applications? Where your app sits in relation to data may not be as important as you think. Write or grab an API wrapper for a critical dataset and throw a simple test app up on a different platform. See what you get. If it performs well, consider putting apps where it makes sense and using a wrapper API with secrets to grant access to data from any validated app.

Some of you are doing this already. Not many, but it’s out there. Excellent job; keep rolling!

Everyone else is kicking rear and taking names, with the world still online every day because of your collective work. So keep rocking it, but consider if you really need the application close to the data these days and, if you do, how data mobility tools might facilitate moving data to the app—something most of us would not have considered for large datasets before the last year or so.

Recent Posts By Don Macvittie
  • Modern DevOps is a Chance to Make Security Part of the Process
  • Raise Those (Feature) Flags
  • In DevOps, Chatbots are a People Problem
Avatar photo More from Don Macvittie
Related Posts
  • How Dispersed Can We Be?
  • Container Considerations on Your DevOps Journey
  • You Might Already be Doing DevOps in the Software-Defined Data Center
    Related Categories
  • Blogs
  • DevOps in the Cloud
  • DevOps Practice
  • Enterprise DevOps
  • Features
  • Infrastructure/Networking
    Related Topics
  • data gravity
  • data portability
  • Persistent Storage
  • storage
Show more
Show less

Filed Under: Blogs, DevOps in the Cloud, DevOps Practice, Enterprise DevOps, Features, Infrastructure/Networking Tagged With: data gravity, data portability, Persistent Storage, storage

« Neo4j Will Use Funds to Expand Managed Cloud Database
The Need for Agile, Adaptable IT Infrastructure »

Techstrong TV – Live

Click full-screen to enable volume control
Watch latest episodes and shows

Upcoming Webinars

How Atlassian Scaled a Developer Security Solution Across Thousands of Engineers
Tuesday, March 21, 2023 - 1:00 pm EDT
The Testing Diaries: Confessions of an Application Tester
Wednesday, March 22, 2023 - 11:00 am EDT
The Importance of Adopting Modern AppSec Practices
Wednesday, March 22, 2023 - 1:00 pm EDT

Sponsored Content

The Google Cloud DevOps Awards: Apply Now!

January 10, 2023 | Brenna Washington

Codenotary Extends Dynamic SBOM Reach to Serverless Computing Platforms

December 9, 2022 | Mike Vizard

Why a Low-Code Platform Should Have Pro-Code Capabilities

March 24, 2021 | Andrew Manby

AWS Well-Architected Framework Elevates Agility

December 17, 2020 | JT Giri

Practical Approaches to Long-Term Cloud-Native Security

December 5, 2019 | Chris Tozzi

Latest from DevOps.com

Grafana Labs Acquires Pyroscope to Add Code Profiling Capability
March 17, 2023 | Mike Vizard
Four Technologies Transforming Data and Driving Change
March 17, 2023 | Thomas Kunnumpurath
Neural Hashing: The Future of AI-Powered Search
March 17, 2023 | Bharat Guruprakash
How Database DevOps Fuels Digital Transformation
March 17, 2023 | Bill Doerrfeld
Large Organizations Are Embracing AIOps
March 16, 2023 | Mike Vizard

TSTV Podcast

On-Demand Webinars

DevOps.com Webinar ReplaysDevOps.com Webinar Replays

GET THE TOP STORIES OF THE WEEK

Most Read on DevOps.com

SVB: When Silly Valley Sneezes, DevOps Catches a Cold
March 14, 2023 | Richi Jennings
Five Great DevOps Job Opportunities
March 13, 2023 | Mike Vizard
Low-Code Should be Worried About ChatGPT
March 14, 2023 | Romy Hughes
Improving the DevOps Process for Mobile App Developers
March 13, 2023 | Tom Tovar
Understanding Cloud APIs
March 14, 2023 | Katrina Thompson
  • Home
  • About DevOps.com
  • Meet our Authors
  • Write for DevOps.com
  • Media Kit
  • Sponsor Info
  • Copyright
  • TOS
  • Privacy Policy

Powered by Techstrong Group, Inc.

© 2023 ·Techstrong Group, Inc.All rights reserved.