Software RAID Vs Hardware RAID: A Tutorial | Liquid Web

What is RAID?

RAID (or a Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) is a way of storing logical data across a medium which is composed of multiple physical hard disk drives blended into one or more logical units or volumes that is used for data redundancy, performance improvement, and reliability.

In this article, we will review what a RAID is, what it consists of, its types (Software and Hardware RAID), storage methods as well as their advantages and disadvantages.

In a specific sense, RAID uses an array of several drive disks which creates a fault-tolerant and high-available arrangement of disks using mirroring or striping. Mirroring is defined as storing files on a set of drives in the server that have been copied in an identical manner across several drives. Striping (or alternation) is defined as storing split files into multiple parts which alternate across the disks. In some RAID configurations, both mirroring and striping is used.

The distinctions in the ways of using mirroring, alternation, and parity management define different RAID levels. Let’s overview them:

• RAID 0 – productive disk array with file alternation but not failure tolerant
• RAID 1 – mirroring disk array
• RAID 5 – disk array characterized by block-level striping and an absence of dedicated parity disk
• RAID 10 – RAID 0 array made of RAID 1 arrays

There are several other RAID levels, but the most popular are listed here. RAID arrays are very popular in designing SAN’s or NAS devices.

What is RAID Parity?

Certain RAID methods use what is called a parity bit which is a common method of error detection during the transmission and storage of data on the array. Parity adds a checksum to the data being shared to a target drives to ensure the data is as close as possible to be indistinguishable from the data on source drives. RAID 5 primary uses parity in its methodology.

Software RAID

It’s important to remember that a RAID controller is at the core of the RAID system. It plays a vital role in data distribution among RAID disk arrays including both Software and Hardware RAID.

Software RAID uses the functionality of the RAID software or the RAID driver built in to the servers operating system. This method does not require any additional equipment to connect storage devices. It can however increase the overall processing load on a server and possibly slow RAID calculations, and other processes being carried out on the device.

Many server operating systems support RAID configuration, including ones from Apple, Microsoft, and various versions of Unix/Linux systems. Quite often, Software RAID depends on the operating system being used, so it’s not recommended for the divisions which are shared by multiple operating systems.

Advantages

• Most operating system support RAID Software configurations which makes it easier to set up and accomplish configuration tasks which solves different issues
• Software RAID installation is much cheaper as it does not require and additional hardware equipment
• Software RAID is mainly suitable for processing simple RAID 0, RAID 1, and RAID 10, which does not cause additional system load
• We can implement a RAID configuration on one operating system (e.g. Ubuntu) and use it across other like systems
• RAID level re-configuration is possible as the settings are flexible and not complicated.

Disadvantages

• Software RAID can significantly influence general system load while carrying out a complicated RAID configuration
• Software RAID implementation is not useful if there are multiple drivers installed on the system, as some conflicts could occur
• Some operating systems support only a limited type of levels of RAID (such as RAID 3, 4, 6, 50, 60, etc.)
• There is limited opportunity to use RAID on a clustered operating system
• Software RAID can be vulnerable to viruses and other malware as it operates within the primary servers operating system
• System failures on the server can have a negative influence on data integrity
• Replacement of failed disk can be complicated

Having looked into Software RAID and some of its advantages and disadvantages, we can conclude that this method can be used for small projects with a limited budgets and when computing power, maximum data safety, and speedy data and disks recovery are not priorities.

Also, it’s essential to keep in mind that these are only general recommendations as the choices will depend on project needs and the tasks which are required to be accomplished.

Hardware RAID

Hardware RAID is the method where all the drives are connected to a hardware RAID controller, which is on a separate RAID card, different server, or built into a motherboard. Hardware RAID controllers physically manage RAID arrays, configurations and support multiple RAID levels. In some cases, the RAID controller can act as a mini version of a computer as they come with dedicated processors to carry out their tasks.

During the Hardware RAID installation process, drives connect to the RAID controller board. This applies not only for large servers but also for desktop computers. Processing Hardware RAID refers to discrete controllers (such as ATA RAID, SATA, DELTA PLC, etc.) on the level of the disk’s storage system.

Because the RAID is managed by and processed on the controller board, there is no additional load on the server processor. Utilizing Hardware RAID also has many other extended functionalities, including a hot swap disk option in case of any one single disk failures. Additionally, Hardware RAID is more expensive than Software RAID, but it has higher productivity and functional compatibility.

Advantages

• High level of system productivity is especially essential for old systems with limited resources to increase computing power
• Hardware RAID uses its cache-memory for making a backup copy and data recovery
• There are fewer issues with RAID systems during the creation of a backup copy and data recovery
• Flexibility while configuring RAID, which is complicated to realize without equipment
• Protection from data loss and corruption may occur if there’s a power outage during the creation of a backup copy as Hardware RAID uses backup batteries and its built-in flash memory
• Works well on all types of disks
• Easy to move the box between computers, servers, and OS
• Compatibility with various OS
• Additional RAID levels (such as RAID 5, 6, 50, 60) can be used; however, they require more resources

#tutorials #array #controller #disk usage #disks #drives #fault tolerance #hardware raid #high availability #hybrid raid #logical volumes #mirroring #nas #parity #parity bits #raid #raid 0 #raid 1 #raid 10 #raid 5 #raid card #raid controller #raid level #redundant array of inexpensive disks #san #software raid #ssd #storage #striping

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Software RAID Vs Hardware RAID: A Tutorial | Liquid Web

What is RAID?

RAID (or a Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) is a way of storing logical data across a medium which is composed of multiple physical hard disk drives blended into one or more logical units or volumes that is used for data redundancy, performance improvement, and reliability.

In this article, we will review what a RAID is, what it consists of, its types (Software and Hardware RAID), storage methods as well as their advantages and disadvantages.

In a specific sense, RAID uses an array of several drive disks which creates a fault-tolerant and high-available arrangement of disks using mirroring or striping. Mirroring is defined as storing files on a set of drives in the server that have been copied in an identical manner across several drives. Striping (or alternation) is defined as storing split files into multiple parts which alternate across the disks. In some RAID configurations, both mirroring and striping is used.

The distinctions in the ways of using mirroring, alternation, and parity management define different RAID levels. Let’s overview them:

• RAID 0 – productive disk array with file alternation but not failure tolerant
• RAID 1 – mirroring disk array
• RAID 5 – disk array characterized by block-level striping and an absence of dedicated parity disk
• RAID 10 – RAID 0 array made of RAID 1 arrays

There are several other RAID levels, but the most popular are listed here. RAID arrays are very popular in designing SAN’s or NAS devices.

What is RAID Parity?

Certain RAID methods use what is called a parity bit which is a common method of error detection during the transmission and storage of data on the array. Parity adds a checksum to the data being shared to a target drives to ensure the data is as close as possible to be indistinguishable from the data on source drives. RAID 5 primary uses parity in its methodology.

Software RAID

It’s important to remember that a RAID controller is at the core of the RAID system. It plays a vital role in data distribution among RAID disk arrays including both Software and Hardware RAID.

Software RAID uses the functionality of the RAID software or the RAID driver built in to the servers operating system. This method does not require any additional equipment to connect storage devices. It can however increase the overall processing load on a server and possibly slow RAID calculations, and other processes being carried out on the device.

Many server operating systems support RAID configuration, including ones from Apple, Microsoft, and various versions of Unix/Linux systems. Quite often, Software RAID depends on the operating system being used, so it’s not recommended for the divisions which are shared by multiple operating systems.

Advantages

• Most operating system support RAID Software configurations which makes it easier to set up and accomplish configuration tasks which solves different issues
• Software RAID installation is much cheaper as it does not require and additional hardware equipment
• Software RAID is mainly suitable for processing simple RAID 0, RAID 1, and RAID 10, which does not cause additional system load
• We can implement a RAID configuration on one operating system (e.g. Ubuntu) and use it across other like systems
• RAID level re-configuration is possible as the settings are flexible and not complicated.

Disadvantages

• Software RAID can significantly influence general system load while carrying out a complicated RAID configuration
• Software RAID implementation is not useful if there are multiple drivers installed on the system, as some conflicts could occur
• Some operating systems support only a limited type of levels of RAID (such as RAID 3, 4, 6, 50, 60, etc.)
• There is limited opportunity to use RAID on a clustered operating system
• Software RAID can be vulnerable to viruses and other malware as it operates within the primary servers operating system
• System failures on the server can have a negative influence on data integrity
• Replacement of failed disk can be complicated

Having looked into Software RAID and some of its advantages and disadvantages, we can conclude that this method can be used for small projects with a limited budgets and when computing power, maximum data safety, and speedy data and disks recovery are not priorities.

Also, it’s essential to keep in mind that these are only general recommendations as the choices will depend on project needs and the tasks which are required to be accomplished.

Hardware RAID

Hardware RAID is the method where all the drives are connected to a hardware RAID controller, which is on a separate RAID card, different server, or built into a motherboard. Hardware RAID controllers physically manage RAID arrays, configurations and support multiple RAID levels. In some cases, the RAID controller can act as a mini version of a computer as they come with dedicated processors to carry out their tasks.

During the Hardware RAID installation process, drives connect to the RAID controller board. This applies not only for large servers but also for desktop computers. Processing Hardware RAID refers to discrete controllers (such as ATA RAID, SATA, DELTA PLC, etc.) on the level of the disk’s storage system.

Because the RAID is managed by and processed on the controller board, there is no additional load on the server processor. Utilizing Hardware RAID also has many other extended functionalities, including a hot swap disk option in case of any one single disk failures. Additionally, Hardware RAID is more expensive than Software RAID, but it has higher productivity and functional compatibility.

Advantages

• High level of system productivity is especially essential for old systems with limited resources to increase computing power
• Hardware RAID uses its cache-memory for making a backup copy and data recovery
• There are fewer issues with RAID systems during the creation of a backup copy and data recovery
• Flexibility while configuring RAID, which is complicated to realize without equipment
• Protection from data loss and corruption may occur if there’s a power outage during the creation of a backup copy as Hardware RAID uses backup batteries and its built-in flash memory
• Works well on all types of disks
• Easy to move the box between computers, servers, and OS
• Compatibility with various OS
• Additional RAID levels (such as RAID 5, 6, 50, 60) can be used; however, they require more resources

#tutorials #array #controller #disk usage #disks #drives #fault tolerance #hardware raid #high availability #hybrid raid #logical volumes #mirroring #nas #parity #parity bits #raid #raid 0 #raid 1 #raid 10 #raid 5 #raid card #raid controller #raid level #redundant array of inexpensive disks #san #software raid #ssd #storage #striping

Custom Software vs Off-the-shelf Software: How to select a better one for your business?

Custom Software or Off-the-shelf software, the question in mind for many business personnel. Read this blog to get help to make the right decision that will benefit your business.
For a business that wants to upgrade and modernize itself with the help of software, a common dilemma it is whether to go for custom-made software or opt for off-the-shelf software. You can find many top software development companies worldwide, but before that all, you should first decide the type of software –an off-the-shelf software or a custom one.
This blog aims to overcome the dilemma and accord some clarity to a business looking to automate its business processes.

#custom software vs off-the-shelf software #custom software development companies #top software development companies #off-the-shelf software development #customized software solution #custom software development

Offshore Software Development - Best Practices

With the rise of globalization and the worldwide lockdown due to the pandemic, most of the work has been done by remote working processes and professionals from their homes. This lockdown has proved the efficiency of remote development and enhanced the trust in offshore software development industry.

To make the most out of the benefits of offshore software development, you should understand the crucial factors that affect offshore development. This is why you should read this guide for the best practices when hiring an offshore software development company. Despite the size and the industry of the business, offshore software development is not beneficial for every entrepreneur in many aspects to make the optimum use of talents in technology across the globe.

Here are some of the top reasons why offshore development is beneficial for your business.

• Offshore development teams can work on flexible timing to provide you with the best possible software development practices.
• Get access to the talents across the world from your home to develop the top of the line software with the help of offshore development companies.
• Assured high quality and next-generation technology expertise with duly NDA signed with respect to the priorities of the business.
• With flexible recruitment models, you can hire the freelance developers, remote development team, or an entire offshore development company with respect to the size of your business.
• Build high-end software applications from one corner of the world by hiring software developers across the world.
• Get immediate access to the best resources without hiring them on a permanent basis.

To avail of all these benefits, you should have clear goals, a list of requirements, and features that are mandatory for your software product.

Here are a few tips to help you find the best offshore software development company. Build a top-notch software application by following the listed best practices.

#web development #how to start offshore software development company #offshore meaning #offshore software development best practices #offshore software development company #offshore software development company in india #offshore software development cost #offshore software development statistics #outsource software development

Scraping Images with Python

Process of building machine learning, deep learning or AI applications has several steps. One of them is analysis of the data and finding which parts of it are usable and which are not. We also need to pick machine learning algorithms or neural network architectures that we need to use in order to solve the problem. We might even choose to use reinforcement learning or transfer learning. However, often clients don’t have data that could solve their problem. More often than not, it is our job to get data from the web that is going to be utilized by machine learning algorithm or neural network.

This bundle of e-books is specially crafted for beginners .

Everything from Python basics to the deployment of Machine Learning algorithms to production in one place.

Become a Machine Learning Superhero TODAY!

This is usually the rule when we work on computer vision tasks. Clients rely on your ability to gather the data that is going to feed your VGG, ResNet, or custom Convolutional Neural Network. So, in this article we focus on the step that comes before data analysis and all the fancy algorithms – data scraping, or to be more precise, image scraping. We are going to show three ways to get images from some web site using Python. In this article we cover several topics:

1. Prerequsites
2. Scraping images with BeutifulSoup
3. Scraping images with Srapy
4. Scraping images from Google with Selenium

#ai #python #beautiful soup #bs4 #image scraping #scrapy #selenium #software #software craft #software craftsmanship #software development #web crawlers #web image crawling #web scraping

Software Developer vs Software Engineer — Differences: Bogus or Real?

Software Developers vs Software Engineers

Personally, it pisses me off. Every time I see an article on this topic, my emotional bank account gets robbed. They are all about SEO. Inappropriate keywords squeezed into tiny sentences just to get better rankings. No intent to entertain or enlighten the reader whatsoever. Sometimes, such articles can even be outright wrong.

And even though the purpose of this blog post can be to generate traffic, I tried to make it more of a meaningful rant than a lifeless academic essay.

So, let’s see how you feel by the time you are done reading this paper.

Without further ado:

Since there are no proper interpretations of both terms, a lot of people use them interchangeably.

However, some companies consider these terms as job titles.

The general “programmer-developer-engineer” trend goes along the lines of:

• A programmer is someone who knows how to code, understands algorithms and can follow instructions. Yet, it doesn’t go further in regards to responsibilities.
• A developer is someone superior to the programmer. Except for coding, they also do design, architecture, and technical documentation of the software component they are building. They might be referred to as leaders, but not necessarily.
• Finally, an engineer implies that you are the real deal. You’ve graduated with a degree, have some tech knowledge, and preferably experience… and you are capable of designing a software system (a combination of software components your peons, the programmers, have built). You’re like an overseer. You can see the bigger picture. And it’s your responsibility to clearly explain that “picture” to your team.

#devops #software development #programming #software engineering #software developer #programmer #software engineer #software engineering career