Experts on Data
 
 

Technical Work Groups

SNIA's Technical Work Groups (TWGs) collaborate to develop and promote vendor-neutral architectures, standards, and education for management, movement, and security for technologies related to handling and optimizing data. If you are thinking about becoming a member of the SNIA, check out what our TWGs are doing. Benefits of joining a Technical Work Group include:

  • Make sure the next revision of the standard meets the technical requirements of your company.
  • Gain in-depth knowledge of the details in the standard being developed and as a result, become an expert on the standard.
    • Fastest way to become an Expert is through participation, not just reading the standard!
  • Work with and get assistance from the other experts on the standard as you develop your implementation of the standard.
  • Participate in the development and become an expert in the Software being developed in support of the standard.

 

Cloud Storage TWG

The Cloud Storage TWG acts as the primary technical entity for the SNIA to identify, develop, and coordinate systems standards for Cloud Storage. This group aims to produce a comprehensive set of specifications and drives consistency of interface standards and messages across the various Cloud Storage related efforts. The TWG also documents system-level requirements and shares these with other Cloud Storage standards organizations under the guidance of the SNIA Technical Council and in cooperation with the SNIA Strategic Alliances Committee.

Learn more about the work of the Cloud Storage TWG.

Computational Storage TWG

The Computational Storage TWG was created for the purpose of establishing architectures and software for storage, disk, and solid state device based functionalities that allow them to be integrated with Computation in its many forms. This TWG creates software and standards that enable specific features for these devices that meet the requirements of stakeholders with these computational needs. 

Learn more about the work of the Computational Storage TWG.

DNA Data Storage TA TWG

The DNA Data Storage TA TWG will dentify areas of the DNA data storage pipeline that are amenable to standardization and launch standardization work in those areas deemed to have reached a level of maturity such that standardization is warranted.

Learn more about the work of the DNA TA TWG.

Green Storage TWG

The Green Storage TWG acts as the primary technical entity for the SNIA to identify, develop, and coordinate technical matters related to energy and cooling of storage networking products. To be effective, standard metrics must be a realistic reflection of efficiency: work accomplished per energy expended, allowing a determination of clear costs for operations. We believe that a variety of types of storage work must be considered, and that several distinct 'figures of merit' will be needed. We believe that the SNIA is uniquely qualified, as an impartial forum with the right participants, to create useful metrics for users.

Learn more about the work of the Green Storage TWG.

I/O Traces, Tools & Analysis TWG

The primary focus of the I/O Traces, Tools, and Analysis (IOTTA) TWG is to create a worldwide repository for storage-related I/O trace collection and analysis tools, application workloads, I/O traces, and best practices around such topics. That repository is located at http://iotta.snia.org

The I/O traces of interest to the IOTTA TWG include those up at the host (e.g., system call, file system), those involving a file server (e.g., NFS, CIFS) and those at the "transport level" (e.g., SCSI, Fibre Channel). I/O traces of application workloads along with the analysis and definition of common, recommended semantics and formats for I/O traces are also specific areas of focus for the TWG. Standardized I/O trace formats/semantics will enable the development and use of common I/O trace collection and analysis tools as well as facilitate the sharing of the I/O traces themselves.

The IOTTA TWG is for those interested in the use of empirical data/metrics to better understand the actual operation and performance characteristics of storage I/O, especially as they pertain to application workloads. This includes not only storage vendors but also storage users as well as those within the academic community who are performing research related to storage I/O and storage devices.

Learn more about the work of the IOTTA TWG.

Object Drive TWG

The Object Drive TWG is created for the purpose of establishing architectures and standards for disk, solid state and tape drive based functionalities that allow them to be higher level storage nodes in emerging scale out solutions. The TWG creates specifications that enable scale out storage systems to add and remove these nodes incrementally and seamlessly.  These specifications are vendor agnostic and support existing and future functionality in drive form factors. 

Scalable Storage Management (SSM) TWG

The SSM TWG is a technical work group of the SNIA Technical Committee defining the Swordfish specification that extends the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF)'s Redfish specification (API) to handle the emanagement of storage equipment and storage services found in modern data centers.

The target market for this interface is Cloud and Web-based IT professionals for scalable storage management and related data services. Within this community, the focus is on usability by non-computing science degree personnel. The interface should be simple to use, accessible, and compatible with the existing tool chains and with modern transports.

The DMTF Scalable Platforms Management Forum (SPMF) creates management specifications for the adjacent server management domain - Redfish.  The SSM TWG collaborates with the DMTF SPMF to align interfaces to enable a seamless, holistic storage system management experience, with goals to:

  • Create an HTTP/HTTPS RESTful interface using the Redfish protocol and schema
  • Produce an extensible interface with sufficient compatibility rules
  • Enable delivery of value-add, vendor-specific data alongside standardized items

Learn more about the work of the SSM TWG.

Security TWG

The Security TWG provides architectures and frameworks for the establishment of information security capabilities within the storage networking industry, including that of stored information in heterogeneous environments. The focus of the Security Work Group is directed toward long-term security solutions, taking into account any security inherent in underlying transports or technologies.

Learn more about the work of the Security TWG.

SFF TA TWG

The SNIA SFF Technology Affiliate (TA) Technical Work Group (TWG) carries forth the longstanding SFF Committee work efforts that has operated since 1990. This group is responsible for the development of technical specifications as SNIA Architecture for storage media, storage networks, and pluggable solutions that complement existing industry standards work that encompass cables, connectors, form factor sizes and housing dimensions, management interfaces, transceiver interfaces, electrical interfaces, and related technologies.  The specifications enable technology vendors to procure compatible, multi-sourced products and solutions.

Learn more about the work of the SFF TA TWG.

Smart Data Accelerator Interface (SDXI) TWG

The SDXI is a proposed standard for a memory to memory Data Mover interface. Software memcpy is the current data movement standard for software implementation due to stable CPU ISA. However, this takes away from application performance and incurs software overhead to provide context isolation. Offload DMA engines and their interface are vendor-specific and not standardized for user-level software.  The SDXI TWG develops and standardizes an extensible, forward-compatible memory to memory data mover interface that is independent of actual data mover implementations and underlying I/O interconnect technology. A PCIe device model is described. The interface can be extended to other device models.

Learn more about the work of the SDXI TWG.

Solid State Storage TWG

The Solid State Storage Technical Work Group has been created for the purpose of developing standards related to system implementations of Solid State Storage technology.
The Solid State Storage TWG:

  • Acts as the primary technical entity for the SNIA to identify, develop, and coordinate systems standards for Solid State Storage.
  • Produces a comprehensive set of specifications and drives consistency of interface standards and messages across the various Solid State Storage related efforts.
  • Documents system-level requirements and shares these with other Solid State Storage standards organizations under the guidance of the SNIA Technical Council and in cooperation with the SNIA Strategic Alliances Committee.

Learn more about the work of the Solid State Storage TWG.

Storage Data Placement TWG

There are a number of data placement techniques to improve performance when storing and retrieving data. These include Zoned Storage (ZS) as defined by three different standards and Flexible Data Placement (FDP) as defined by NVM Express. In a each of these, the host and device cooperate regarding data placement on the device. For SSDs,  this enables: a lower Write Amplification Factor (WAF)  lower overprovisioning, more predictable performance, and potential device cost reduction. For HDDs, Zoned Storage enables the use of SMR drives, which deliver the highest capacities, as well as performance benefits.

Command interfaces for data placement have been standardized (ZS is standardized in ZAC/ZBC for SMR HDDs and ZNS for NVMe SSDs; FDP is standardized in the NVMe NVM Command Set). These specifications leave flexibility in how host software interacts with the IO stack, resulting in different application best practices depending on the use case. The ZS ecosystem benefits from the description of common use cases, and a nomenclature around which corresponding host/device models can be described. The FDP ecosystem likewise benefits from a description of how to configure and use a FDP capable device.
The Storage Data Placement TWG facilitates the use of the devices by:

  • providing a common industry understanding of ZS use cases and creating a host/device architecture and programming model that  provides a framework for ZS design and enabling the development of a robust ZS solutions ecosystem; and
  • providing a whitepaper that details how a FDP device should be configured and accessed to minimize WAF and maximize performance.

 

To learn more about any of the above TWGs or to get involved email Arnold Jones at tcmd@snia.org.