Case studies for IPspaces

How SSPs use IPspaces

SSPs typically provide storage services to customers of different companies who have the following specifications:

They use the private address space, such as 10.0.0.0, for their intranet.
They want a dedicated connection from the storage system at the SSP premises to their intranet.
They want to ensure that the storage system is accessible only to the users they authorize.

Using the IPspace solution available on the storage systems, the SSP sets up a dedicated IPspace for each customer, thus creating independent routing domains on a single storage system. Additionally, the SSP uses either physical interfaces or VLAN tags to securely forward traffic to appropriate vFiler units. This approach

Is cost effective
Scales well
Provides easy maintenance and monitoring

How an enterprise uses IPspaces

In an enterprise, the IT organization might have to maintain separate storage systems for each organization of the enterprise. As in the SSP approach, dedicating entire storage systems on an organizational basis can be not only expensive but also difficult to maintain. Setting up vFiler units on a per-organization basis solves the problem. However, distinct IPspaces for these vFiler units are usually not required. Because there is usually a level of trust between different organizations of the enterprise, network access to the various vFiler units does not need to controlled. Therefore, all vFiler units can belong to the default IPspace.

IPspaces can be used in an enterprise setup as well if there is a need to route traffic from different vFiler units using different default routes.