management technology for Linux[r] that is designed to streamline and
enhance storage management capabilities for the enterprise. The new
technology is the result of extensive collaboration among developers in the
Linux open community and the IBM Linux Technology Center (LTC)
http://ibm.com/linux/ltc.
Operating systems manage storage and file volumes on servers by compressing
them, controlling and balancing access. The new volume management system
for Linux will help make Linux capable of managing more content, files and
users, larger servers and at the same time making it easier to use. With
the new volume management technology, Linux is more capable of supporting
the enterprise level business applications customers need.
The Enterprise Volume Management System (EVMS) version 1.0.0 is a
state-of-the-art, easy to use volume manager of unparalleled flexibility
and expandability. EVMS integrates all aspects of disk, partition, and
volume management into a single, enterprise level design and
implementation, bringing industrial strength features found in proprietary
volume managers to Linux. As a result of the highly modular, plug-in
nature of EVMS, customers will be able to use this technology as their
companies’ needs grow and change and as new technologies become available.
EVMS is 100% open source, available for all community members to use, and
is licensed under the GPL.
EVMS technology significantly expands the Volume Management capabilities
found in Linux today by allowing users to access data and manage volumes
from virtually any operating system. In addition, when used to emulate
Volume Managers found in other non-Linux operating systems, EVMS can help
significantly reduce the expense and technical barriers associated with
migrating to a Linux platform.
“EVMS technology is a quantum leap forward in readying Linux for the
enterprise,” said Daniel Frye, Director, Linux Technology Center, IBM.
“When adopted in the base, EVMS will make Linux volume management
world-class.”
The EVMS project has its home on SourceForge (http://www.sf.net/projects/evms) and has hundreds of downloads with every
release, totaling tens of thousands of downloads received in less than one
year. The community is very active and has been involved with EVMS since
its inception in January of 2001. Several Linux distributors are currently
evaluating EVMS for inclusion in upcoming releases.
“EVMS technology is an impressive technological step in Linux storage
management, and SuSE welcomes the additional availability and migration
features,” said Boris Nalbach, CTO of SuSE Linux AG. “Such technology will
enable all enterprises to take even more advantage of using Linux for
mission critical applications.”
“The key to flexible processing power is making it easy to run Linux in any
enterprise environment. And that means making it easier for enterprises to
run their data centers,” said Ly-Huong Pham, CEO of Turbolinux. “Like
IBM, Turbolinux has a commitment to accelerate the penetration of Linux in
the enterprise by implementing features like EVMS in upcoming releases of
our Linux operating environments for enterprise servers and developers.
EVMS shows the industry that Linux provides unprecedented degrees of
interoperability and power at a very low cost.”
This inclusive, extensible volume manager utilizes a plug-in system that
supports all volume management capabilities found in Linux today and is
flexible enough to allow for the emulation of volume managers found in
other operating systems and other proprietary technologies. EVMS version
1.0.0 provides support for multiple disk partitioning schemes, mirroring
(RAID 1), striping with and without parity (RAID 0, 4, 5), drive linking,
bad block relocation, and volume groups.
A Volume Manager provides a virtual view of local and remote storage. This
virtual view can be used to combine or divide physical storage in a variety
of ways such as combining several physical disks to appear as one large
disk. Additionally, Volume Managers can support various capabilities such
as RAID support, Volume groups, encryption, compression and much more.
IBM Open Source Projects
EVMS is the latest of among over 70 projects that the LTC is currently
engaged in with the Open Source community. A full listing, with links to
project pages, can be found at http://www.ibm.com/linux/ltc. The LTC is
committed to working with the Open Source development community to add
Enterprise and Carrier Grade capabilities to Linux. This includes work to
advance: scalability, serviceability, serviceability tooling, performance,
directory services, Samba, printer support, security, networking, network
security, Linux Standards Base and LI18NUX standards initiatives, test
harnesses and test cases, storage/IO, file systems, volume managment,
device drivers, reliability, documentation, embedded Linux, availability,
and many other areas. The LTC also works with and supports a range of
communities including the Open Source Development Laboratory, Open Source
Initiative, KDE League, GNOME Foundation, Free Software Foundation, Free
Standards Group, and USENIX. The LTC mission is simply to “Help make
Linux better”.
About IBM
IBM is the world’s number one server company and information technology
provider, with 80 years of leadership in helping businesses innovate. IBM
helps customers, business partners and developers in a wide range of
industries that leverage the power of the Internet for e-business. For more
information, visit http://www.ibm.com.
IBM is a registered trademark of International Business Machines
Corporation. Linux is a registered trademark of Linux Torvalds.
Category:
- Linux
