Jeda Networks, a startup that’s talked about its intention to provide software for virtualizing storage networks, is a few steps closer to delivering on its vision. The company said Wednesday it will start offering its Fabric Network Controller in an early-ship program next month and make it generally available over the summer.
As is the case with software-defined networks, the Jeda controller software will separate the control plane from from the data plane. It will run on a virtualized server and take charge of the intelligence that would otherwise reside on a switch. SDN can have a wide range of benefits, although it generally can permit more programmability and elasticity of networks. For Jeda, virtualizing storage-area networks could allow customers to generate and disable those networks in response to changes in demand.
Other companies other than Newport Beach, Calif.-based Jeda are likewise looking to make software-defined storage a reality, including Convergent.io, ScaleIO and SwiftStack. Approaches differ among those entities, but they share the goal of bringing storage up to the level of programmability of compute resources and, increasingly, networks.
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