First impressions of the new GDS2 webgui

Here you see the first screenshots of the new GUI of GDS2. It is based on extjs from (www.sencha.com) using the JSON API of the GDS.

WebDAV Interoperability

Even the future of the WebDAV standard might be quite unclear it is still used be several hosters and cloud software stacks like ownCloud, SSP Data Space or GRAU DATA SPACE. Many clients have interoperability problems with some servers. Therefore I will test several clients with the new GDS2 and report about interoperability problems.

At first I checked the sever with the litmus interoperability suite. Here you see the results:

The GDS2 WebDAV implementation passed 12 of 16 test. Please let me know your experiences with your favourite WebDAV server. Current Windows clients (Win7) and MacOSX are reported to work without any problems.

I am a Linux user, so I will put my focus on Linux clients:

Nautilus

Nautilus (3.4.2 - gvfs 1.14) connects without any problem to the GDS2. There are obviously some problems with UTF-8 as the litmus test already told us:

Dolphin

Dolphin also connects without problems. It obviously has no problems with the UTF-8 implementation of GDS2 but it does not display the modification date of the files on the server:

Libre Office 4

The brand new libreoffce version 4 includes a webdav and a CMIS client implementation. Browsing the server worked as expected:

Storing an existing file works, creating a new one produces an error:

Cloud attached GDS2

The new GDS2 architecture allows a distributed setup and an master/master replication between several locations.

Small companies might consider a cloud attached setup to get a certain level of redundancy of their data. Another reason might be to get better access performance and a higher security level via a centralized data center. The centralized instance might work as distribution hub for several distributed site. Deutsche Wolke offers this kind of services in the bunker data center of COMback.

UPDATE: After some brainstorming in Stuttgart last week, we are planning to shrink the footprint of the GDS2 core to fit into an ARM based appliance. The result will be a Data Space in a Box. The replication feature helps us to attach this box to the cloud or to other branch offices. Please contact me if you are interested in bundling the GDS2 with your hardware.

GDS2 with FSA integration

GRAU DATA developed a software called file server archiver (FSA). The FSA automatically analyzes data from files servers according to predefined parameters. Inactive and/or seldom-used files are then automatically transferred to any desired NAS storage or archive system or object stores. The user can access the relocated data whenever desired. FSA software completes the concept of hierarchical storage management in heterogeneous networks.

With the new architecture we will integrate the FSA functionality with GDS2. The user will be able to view/access/recall all files which are replicated from a file server to the object store in the web gui of GDS2. The integration between FSA and the core of GDS2 will be achieved by an ESB which get a message when the FSA has written an object to the object store. GDS2 will update the meta data and handle the file like an internal object. The user now can decide whether the object will be restored on the original file server location or he can access it through the GDS2 clients (web, desktop, mobile).

With this solution we will be to eliminate the need of a file server backup. The user can access multiple versions of the original file. The costs for the backup infrastructure will be reduced (software and administration).