MasStore pilot project

WiscNet is proposing a pilot project to provide as much storage as we can use for DR, CDBR, etc. Usage neutral, vendor neutral, and acronym neutral. Because it's a pilot project, we shouldn't put any critical or production data on it. Use it, try it, break it.

Problem: When something it free, and there is no expiration date, people don't use it. So, we will have to pay for it a bit. Pilot will have an application process, as well as a dollar amount to join.

Need volunteers for the pilot process.

MasStore

I'm attending WiscNet's MasStore event at the Pyle Center to discuss "shared large-scale multipurpose IP-accessible storage." It will include a with about fifty other state organizations how we can cooperatively aggregate storage resources to meet our data storage, backup, and recovery needs. This is something that has evolved over the past two years of work with the Critical Data Backup and Recovery working group (CDBR). Now that WiscNet has launched their "Grow Smart" initiative, bandwidth is not the critical limiter it was a year ago. GrowSmart is "unlimited network access at a fixed, multi-year cost."

The storage landscape has changed. Several vendors are going to present possible solutions today, and then the fifty or so attending WiscNet member organizations will ask questions. After the vendors are gone, the members will discuss how we can possibly use their services, and more importantly, each other, to solve our data backup needs.