Dell DX Object Storage – File Gateway Architectural Reference
Scope of this Document
This document provides an overview of the Dell DX Object Storage CFS Gateway solution and lists the
hardware and software components that are used in the solution.
For more detailed information about deploying this solution or any of its components, see
support.dell.com.
Overview
The Dell DX Object Storage platform, initially released in May 2010, integrates applications via native
HTTP writes. The DX Object Storage Gateway solution extends access to DX Object Storage by adding a
file system interface that supports Windows & UNIX clients.
The interface is provided by CIFS/NFS software that runs on a PowerEdge R410 server. In the Gateway
solution this is called the Cluster File Server (CFS), and it provides a file system interface that enables
customers to write files to DX Object Storage as they would any other file system. The write to the DX
Object Storage system is indirect, however, as the files temporarily reside in spool cache on the CFS
server or on a shared storage device.
In a single-server Gateway solution, data objects are written to a spool that is on the CFS and then
moved to a storage node in the DX Object Storage cluster once the write is complete; in a failover
configuration, the files are written to a Dell PowerVault MD3200i storage system, which persists the
data in the event that a CFS fails. See "Specific CFS Configurations" for more details.
Standard hardware
The following briefly describes the standard hardware components of DX Object Storage Gateway
solutions. In most cases, none of these components are yet installed at the customer site.
Cluster File Server (CFS) – This server hosts the file server software that presents the Dell DX
Object Storage system as a standard file system. In single-server solutions, this server also
provides a spool cache on local disk.
Cluster Services Node (CSN) – This node is the head of the DX Object Storage systems and
hosts the services that run on the cluster, such as cluster services, storage services, and
content router (if applicable). It is not used for data storage.
Storage Nodes – These nodes host data that is indirectly written to them by application servers
(via the spool cache). A minimum of two nodes is required, and each data object has at least
one replica.
Shared Storage System – Shared storage is a cache where files are stored before they get
written to the DX Object Storage and also where they can be accessed on subsequent reads, if
locally available. A separate shared storage system, such as the MD3200i is required for failover
solutions. In these types of solutions, if the gateway server fails over to another gateway
server, the common spool cache is still available to either write its data to the storage nodes,
or serve data to clients.
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