Tag: Computer Weekly

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Computer Weekly features: August 2022

I am working on the features below for Computer Weekly (for late August/early September publication). Deadlines for contributions noted against each article.

Data classification policy

How do you write a data classification policy, and more importantly, what should it cover?

In this feature we will look at:

  • What do we understand by data classification?
  • What is it used for? (eg for, backups, compliance, storage management and budgeting)
  • What does such a policy take into account?
  • What are the benefits of data classification?
  • What are the key elements of a data classification policy, and how would you start drafting one?

Deadline for contributions: Friday 5th August

How do we measure cloud storage TCO?

What are the key things to take into account when working out cloud storage costs as a total cost of ownership?

This piece will drill down into the main cost areas for cloud storage services. These could include capacity, storage tiers, AZs and egress costs, though that is not an exhaustive list. The piece will also compare these costs with the costs of on-premises storage technology.

In addition, we will look at which workloads are the most (cost) effective in the cloud, both for long term and “boost” usage and which, for now, are not.

Deadline for contributions: Friday 12th August.

Cloud bursting 

This piece is an “explainer setting out when, why and how firms will “burst” their workloads to the cloud. The piece will cover:

  • What is cloud bursting?
  • What are the benefits of cloud bursting?
  • What type of workloads can benefit from cloud bursting?
  • What are the limits / obstacles to cloud bursting?
  • What workloads are never (or almost never) likely to use cloud bursting?
  • How difficult is cloud bursting?

Deadline for contributions: Friday 19th August.

For all these articles please contact me by email in the first instance, if you are contributing to a specific article please note that in the subject line. If you are responding on behalf of more than one client, please use separate emails. Many thanks.

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Computer Weekly: storage features, July 2022

I am looking for input for the following two features:

Backups and recovering from ransomware attacks

What are the benefits of having a good data protection strategy when facing ransomware. And what are the shortcomings of data protection and backup that cannot overcome the likely effects of a ransomware attack?

The piece will cover:

RPOs and RTOs. What could be the effect of ransomware attacks on how much data you can recover and from how long before the attack?

How useful as media to recover from are: backups, snapshots, cloud storage and backup and tape?

To what extent is it possible to air-gap stored data?

In what order should data be restored when recovering?

Deadline for submissions: Wednesday, 6 July

Unstructured data storage – on-prem vs cloud vs hybrid

What are the pros and cons of storing unstructured data on-prem vs in the cloud, and what is the role of technologies that allow for hybrids between the two?

The piece will cover:

What are unstructured data and why are they important?

How big an issue is storing unstructured data?

What are the pros and cons of:

On-prem: The ‘classic’ use of large-scale scale-out file storage, and the more recent use of object storage, and attempts to converge the two

Use of cloud storage

Hybrid approaches, including Snowflake, where unstructured data is given structure and on-prem can be a source.

Deadline for submissions: Wednesday 20th July

For all these articles please contact me by email in the first instance, if you are contributing to a specific article please note that in the subject line. Many thanks.

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Computer Weekly features: June 2022

I am researching the following features for Computer Weekly, with deadlines in June:

Data gravity

What is data gravity, what implications does it have for data storage, and to what extent can it be mitigated

The piece will over these points:

  • What is data gravity? (for a definition see this TechTarget article)
  • What causes it? 
  • Give examples, large and smaller-scale perhaps, on-prem and cloud, any trends (eg, to edge?)
  • What impact does it have on data storage?
  • What impact does it have on cost, management etc.
  • What can be done, from a storage perspective, to mitigate data gravity?

Deadline for contributions: Monday 6 June.

Global file systems 

What are ‘global file systems’, who are the main vendors and what are the key differences between their products?

What are the common features of the ‘global file system’ products offered by vendors

What customer challenges do they solve?

How do they differ from file-and-sync services or just using the cloud?

Note, this piece will build on an earlier article (here) but will focus on the specific vendors in the space and their offerings. Please contact me directly for information on the vendors.

Deadline for contributions: Monday 13 June.

Backup maintenance

What do you need to do to ensure backups are maintained and reliable?

This is an advisory article setting out what should be done to ensure backups are maintained, and work. This will include cloud, virtualised and container environments.

Points we hope to cover include:

  • Ensuring all sources that need to be backed up are backed up
  • Ensuring backup targets are maintained and accessible
  • Potential areas of risk or failure, including hardware and human factors
  • Testing
  • Potential human, infrastructure etc failures
  • The need to keep backup software up to date.

Deadline for contributions: Friday 17 June.

For all these articles please contact me by email in the first instance, if you are contributing to a specific article please note that in the subject line. Many thanks.

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Upcoming storage features: May 2022

I am writing a set of storage features for Computer Weekly. These will be published in May.

How data protection can help against ransomware, and where it can’t

Which backup and recovery technologies can safeguard against ransomware? And what are the limitations of backup and disaster recovery tools, and techniques, to protect against this type of incident?

In the past we have covered immutable snapshots and offsite backups including tape, as well as recovery strategies tailored to ransomware. This feature will draw together lessons learned by organisations that have faced ransomware attacks, and cover the backup and recovery industry’s tools and advice.

Deadline for leads: Wednesday 20 April

Products for backing up containers

This feature is an overview of leading Kubernetes backup technologies.

How do they work, how are they best used, and how do organisations acquire them (eg are they standalone or part of a larger product suite).

We are open to vendor submissions but do please look at our previous coverage on this.

Deadline for leads: Wednesday 27 April

Obstacles to hybrid cloud storage – and how resolve them

This piece will look at situations that can make it hard for organisations to move to object storage, and how they can overcome them. We are looking to identify the most important hybrid storage barriers, as well as ways around the problems.

Inevitably, the piece will look at hybrid cloud in the context of both pure-play cloud and on-premises storage. But there is a working assumption that CIOs will be looking at hybrid cloud, if they’re not already using it, that it has advantages, and that businesses want to do more of it.

Deadline for leads: Wednesday 27 April

Please contact me by email if you can supply information or propose a spokesperson.

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Upcoming feature: Storage requirements for AI, ML, and analytics

For Computer Weekly, I am writing a feature looking at the storage requirements for AI, machine learning and analytics technologies.

This will include:

the demands these technologies make on storage infrastructure

The types of storage are best for the varying workloads in these areas (file, block, object, cloud

What storage vendors recommend for AI/ML/analytics use cases, and by workload

The deadline for leads is Wednesday, 16 March, with interviews the week after.

Please get in touch via the usual email address.

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Upcoming feature: navigating cloud computing costs

For Computer Weekly, I am writing this feature:

Cloud computing is often held to be the way to save on IT infrastructure costs. But do the cost savings actually stack up? And do IT departments have the skills and resources to fully cost up the different options available from cloud providers?

The article will ask:

  • What are the key challenges in cloud cost management? And what underlies them? (in terms of the structure of the market, key cloud providers etc)
  • What are the key planks of an optimised cloud purchasing strategy?
  • What vendors or services can help manage cloud costs, and how do they do this?

More detailed questions will be supplied to experts offering comment. We want to include storage costs in the article.o

Please respond with any leads by Tuesday 8th Feb, 1700hrs; all interviews will need to be completed by Friday 11 February.

Please get in touch via the usual email address.

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Computer Weekly storage features: October 2021

I am currently working on the following features, and would appreciate technical and other background material (generally, CW does not quote vendors:)

Five things you need to know about hybrid cloud in 2021 (deadline for input: 7th October)

How is hybrid cloud is seen by customers and vendors currently?

  • How is hybrid cloud used?
  • What are the top use cases for hybrid cloud deployments?
  • What are the limitations of hybrid cloud? What does it actually mean in practice?
  • What are the pitfalls of a hybrid cloud architecture?
  • What use cases are least suited to hybrid cloud?
  • Where next for hybrid cloud? (possibly more widespread use of containers allowing for bursting to the cloud as an easier option than currently?)

5 ways HCI has changed in 2021 (deadline: 20 October)

Hyper-converged infrastructure seems to be here to stay as an on-prem solution. But how is it changing in 2021 to meet new IT trends?

Areas could include:

  • HCI being used with containers
  • Being able to scale storage and compute independently (they’re calling it ‘disaggregation’)
  • Vendors dropping products (eg, NetApp)
  • HCI as a service (may be available from many vendors with a consumption model)
  • HCI at the edge

Five reason customers repatriate data from the cloud (deadline: 3 November)

Why do businesses repatriate data from the cloud?

Restoring backups/business recovery is the obvious one, but analytics and possibly regulatory investigations / compliance are others.

The piece will set out the main reasons, and look at the mechanics and costs of data repatriation too.

As ever, please email any leads or submissions.

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Computer Weekly commissions: October 2021

I am working on the following articles, which will appear in Computer Weekly in October:

Cloud DR: DIY or Disaster Recovery as a Service

The cloud is now the main backup destination for a growing number of businesses. And the range of businesses offering disaster recovery as a service is growing too.

But is disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS) always the best option? Or is it better to develop a solution in house, using off the shelf (cloud) technologies?

The piece will look at the benefits of DIY approaches, and the drawbacks, and compare these to the benefits (and drawbacks) of DRaaS. The piece will also summarise the range of DRaaS services on the market, and set out the best use cases for each.

I’d welcome analyst comment and/or industry case studies for this piece. Deadline for leads: Thursday 16th September.

Where next for the data warehouse, and what might replace it?

Has the conventional data warehouse had its day? And what could replace it? Conventional, on-premises data warehouse technology now competes with a range of emerging technologies, including data virtualisation, “data lakehouses”, and cloud data warehouses.

What role will these newer technologies play? Are they likely to supplant the conventional, on-premises, datacentre approach, and if so why?

I am keen to speak to analysts and consultants in order to form a market overview, but also CIOs whose preferences are either for the new, or indeed the conventional, technology. The deadline is Wednesday 22nd September.

For either article please get in touch in the first instance by email.

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New storage articles for Computer Weekly

I am working on two new feature articles for Computer Weekly. There is some overlap between the two topics, so I am posting them both here.

The topics are:

Key questions to ask suppliers about storage-as-a-service consumption models

5 things you need to know about cloud file services

For the first piece, this is a brief for CIOs and their teams sourcing cloud storage. We will come up with a ranked list of questions IT teams should ask vendors. These could include:

  • payment models
  • how usage is calculated
  • how does pricing change as demand goes up or down
  • how can I upgrade systems
  • minimum contract commitments
  • what is the maximum (or minimum) storage capacity the vendor can offer?

There might be other points that could be added to the list. I cannot use vendor quotes directly but can look at research, and take analyst comments.

For the second piece, we are aiming to distinguish between fully featured cloud file services, including those from the “big three” and file and sync type services such as Box or Dropbox.

The piece will set out the benefits and limitations of cloud-based file services and explain how they are used. And the article will identify the main vendors, both pure play and those that are part of a wider cloud (storage) offering.

The deadline for leads and content is 1700hrs, Tuesday 17th August. These articles will be published in September. If you can help, please submit any ideas or content by email .

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Upcoming article for Computer Weekly: disaster recovery for small businesses

In this piece, we will look at best practice for SMEs when it comes to disaster recovery.

The piece will look at the importance of an initial plan, how to assess risks and create a relevant RTO and RPO for the organisation, the DR options offered by cloud storage and applications, and the growing role played by disaster recovery as a service.

Contacts and supporting information needs to reach me by Friday 23rd July. If you can help, please submit any ideas or content by email .

I am especially interested in hearing from SMEs about how their DR planning works.