By Caitlin Moore, Product Marketing Manager, Data Domain
Every Moo
Down in Moo-ville
Liked tape backups a lot…
But the Grinch,
Who lived just north of Moo-ville,
Did NOT!
The Grinch hated tape backups! He considered it treason!
Now, some might ask why. But there’s not just one reason.
It could be that he hated working all through the night.
It could be, perhaps, that he was getting tired of the fight.
But I think that the most likely reason of all
Was that when he went to recover, he found a giant tape ball.
But,
Whatever the reason,
The ball or no snooze,
He stood there on Christmas Eve, hating the Moos,
Staring down from his cave with a sour, Grinchy frown
At the warm lighted windows below in their town.
For he knew every Moo down in Moo-ville beneath
Was busy backing up to tape while he grit his teeth.
“And they’re mounting tapes!” he snarled with a sneer.
“Tomorrow is Christmas! It’s practically here!”
Then he growled, his Grinch fingers nervously drummed,
“I MUST find a way to prevent my Christmas from being ruined!”
For, tomorrow, he knew…
… just one restore request would cease all his joys
He’d be stuck searching for tapes, while others got new toys!
One of many Christmases a tape backup destroys
This Grinch couldn’t relax with his young Grinch boys.
Then he got an idea!
A beautiful idea!
THE GRINCH
GOT A WONDERFUL, BEAUTIFUL IDEA!
His friend once told him about Data Domain
A solution from EMC that would keep him sane
He could get rid of tapes and save a bundle of time
And it would only cost him a small Moo dime.
So the Grinch grabbed the phone, and called his sales rep
Ordered a DD160 in a few simple steps.
Now he’d go to town and steal every last tape
He’d soon be a hero and be given a Moo cape
He went into town and entered the first house
He stole all their tapes as quietly as a mouse
As he snuck out the door he turned and saw a small Moo!
Little Sandy-Lou Moo, who was not more than two.
The Grinch had been caught by this little Moo daughter
Who’d got out of bed for a cup of cold water
She stared at the Grinch and said, “Why,
“Why are you taking our backup tapes? WHY?”
But, you know, that old Grinch was so smart and so slick
He explained how the Data Domain would do just the trick!
“It will reduce our backup footprint by 10 to 30x!” he exclaimed,
“Restores won’t fail, tapes won’t get lost and I won’t be blamed.
“So I ordered one for Mooville, my dear.
“It will be to simple to use, you’ll see when it’s here.”
Then
He explained the same thing
At each Moo house
After transforming Mooville
Backup tapes would soon
belong to a mouse!
When the system arrived, the Grinch couldn’t wait to show,
How easily it integrated, the Moos wondered: “How could it be so?
It came without cartridges! It came with just disk!
“These new systems eliminate all that risk!”
The Grinch explained with pride, deduplication means tapes no more.
Then the Grinch showed them something he hadn’t before!
“With replication,” he thought, “no more sending tapes offsite to store.
“All this with our existing network, not a bit of bandwidth more!”
And what happened then…?
Well… in Moo-ville they say
That the Grinch became the hero
Of the year, month, week, day!
The minute Data Domain was in place, they knew he was right
The Grinch was thrilled they didn’t put up a fight
And he brought back the tapes! Now that he wasn’t a liar!
And he…
…HE HIMSELF…!
The Grinch threw them straight into the fire!
Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the Data Center
Not a creature was stirring, not even any deduplication.
The cables were hung by the VMAX with care,
In hopes that more data soon would be there.
The admins were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of massive data growth danced in their heads.
And Danielle in her ‘kerchief, and Phil in his cap,
Had just settled their brains for a long winter’s nap.
When out of the data center there arose such a clatter,
Phil sprang from his bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the keyboard he flew like a flash,
Tore open the GUI and threw up the dash.
The glow on the monitor of the backup data growth
Gave the lustre of more tape to budgets below.
When, what to his wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tinny reindeer.
With a little old driver, so lively and astute,
I knew in a moment it must be St Dedupe.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name!
"Now Windows! now, Exchange! now, SQL and Linux!
On, Oracle! On, VMWare! On Commvault and Unix!
To the top of the SAN! to the top of the wall!
Now dedupe away! Dedupe away! Dedupe away all!"
As whole data sets that before the hashing commands,
When they meet with a dedupe algorythm, shrink to the size of a grain of sand.
So up to the data center-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of Data Domain, and St Dedupe too.
And then, in a twinkling, Phil heard on the rack
The prancing and pawing of Lnet’s data expanse.
As Phil drew in his head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St Dedupe came with a bound.
He was dressed all in disk, from his head to his foot,
And his enclosures were all tarnished with ashes and soot.
A bundle of Data Domains he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler, just opening his pack.
His lights-how they twinkled! his disks how raided (6)!
His footprint was tiny, his bezel not faded!
His droll little cable was drawn up like a bow,
And the “U” of his rack was as small as Fraggle from that 80’s Kid’s show.
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the cost savings it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face and a small set of disks,
That spun when he deduped, eliminating risk!
He was performance driven and reliable, a right jolly old elf,
And Phil laughed when he saw him, in spite of himself!
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave Phil to know his environment was protected.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And shrunk all the data, then turned with a jerk.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
- Mike Batelli, December 21, 2011 at 11:14 amAnd away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
"Happy Dedupe to all, and to all a good-night!"