Hyperconverged Infrastructure and Software-Defined IT Glossary

A

Agility: The ability to respond rapidly and adaptively to changes in the industry or to internal or customer requirements. 

Availability: The length of time a system or component is continuously operational and accessible for use or service.

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B

Big data: Large data sets that are analyzed to reveal patterns and trends related to human behavior and interactions.

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C

Chassis: A metal frame that structurally supports electronic components such as circuit boards and wiring. 

Cisco: A manufacturer of networking hardware, software, telecommunications equipment and other high-technology services and products. Specializes in enterprise hardware and networking solutions that use automation and machine learning.

Citrix: A software company that provides server, application and desktop virtualization, networking, software as a service, and cloud computing technologies.

Cognitive analytics: A strategy that uses AI and machine learning to collect data from various sources, draw conclusions, and turn experience into business intelligence, such as on an organization’s internal processes or customer preferences, to give businesses a competitive edge.

Converged infrastructure:  A tactic to structuring an IT system that groups several components into a single computing package.

Compute: Concepts and objects geared toward using a computer to manage, process, and communicate information.

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D

Data compression: Modifying data’s bit structure to reduce the amount of space data needs on a disk to minimize its storage requirements.

Deduplication: Eliminating redundant data in a data set to reduce storage costs and processing overhead.

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F

Firewall: A network security device that monitors traffic to or from a network based on predetermined security rules, putting up a barrier between trusted and untrusted sources. 

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H

HPE: Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) is a tech company that split its operation into two: HP is the printer and PC side, while HPE deals with enterprise products and services.        

Hyperconverged infrastructure: A software-defined, unified system that combines all the elements of a traditional data center, including storage, compute, networking, and management, into a single system in an attempt to minimize data center complexity and increase scalability.

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I

IBM: IBM, which stands for International Business Machines, is a global information technology company that provides a wide spectrum of hardware, software and services offerings, including enterprise hardware and open source software development tools.     

Intrusion protection: A network-security tool that is used to detect malicious activity occurring over a network and/or system so potential threats can be identified and responded to swiftly.

IT as a service (ITaaS): A catalog of paid IT services delivered from a provider to a company on an as-needed basis.

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L

Load balancing: The efficient distribution of network or application traffic across multiple servers.

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M

Microsoft: An American multinational technology company and global vendor that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells computer software, mobile and gaming systems, consumer electronics, personal computers, and cloud services.

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NetApp: Tech company that provides cloud data services, data storage software, data backup and recovery, all-flash storage, converged systems, data infrastructure management, and hybrid flash storage.

Network: The connection between a system of computers and other devices (such as printers) that enables them to communicate with one another and share data.      

Nodes: Any system or device connected to a network acting as a connection point, a redistribution point, or a communication endpoint.       

Nutanix: A cloud computing company that sells hyperconverged infrastructure software, cloud services, and software-defined storage.

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S

Scalability: The ability to add resources to a system to increase capacity or performance to handle increased workloads.

Servers: Computer hardware that manages network resources, processes requests, and delivers data for programs or devices.

Silos: A collection of information or raw data that is accessible by one department but not available to the rest of that organization.

Single pane of glass management: A management tool that combines information from varied sources across multiple applications and environments into one display.     

Software: A set of data and other operating information that instructs computers on how to perform various tasks.  

Software-defined: The ability to control the functions of a system using software.

Software-defined access: Automates user and device policy for applications through a single network fabric to help organizations enable policy-based automation from the edge to the cloud.

Software-defined anything (SDx): The evolving of software to expand its compatibility with different types of portable devices and multi-piece hardware systems, allowing for software control of a greater range of devices.

Software-defined architecture: A flexible web scale that introduces a layer of virtualization between software and consumers, making it possible to make changes to the underlying software easily, without affecting the consumer.

Software-defined automation: A data center or IT infrastructure in which control over existing tools and processes is fully automated by software to make systems move faster.

Software-defined backup: Processes that automate the backup and restore of data and grant the ability to execute a restore on demand, all while allowing continued use of machines and other technology. 

Software-based solutions: The ability to run servers, applications, and workloads on virtual machines.

Software-defined block storage: Block-level storage, used in SAN environments, stores data in volumes, referred to as blocks.

Software-defined branch: Software that unites multiple network functionalities onto a single, centrally managed platform, replacing or supplementing an existing branch network architecture. 

Software-defined cloud computing: A method of increasing data center performance by extending virtualization to all resources, including compute, storage, and networks. 

Software-defined cloud networking (SDCN): Automates data center features through an external control/switch to program the network devices to enhance the flow of traffic and accommodate new processing requests.

Software-defined compute: When a computing function is removed from its hardware and virtualized so that the operation can be managed through a central interface.

Software-defined connectors: Cloud-ready software applications that perform the transfer of control and data among components.      

Software-defined cryptography: A security approach to prevent unauthorized access to digital information by storing and using cryptographic keys and secrets for data, making proven security methods a core requirement for unveil.

Software-defined data center: A data center delivered in which networking, storage, CPU, and security are virtualized.

Software-defined edge: A type of distributed computing that shifts computation and data storage to a closer proximity to the location where it is needed, saving bandwidth and improving response times.

Software-defined enterprise: An IT architecture in which each enterprise application can operate on any device, at anytime and anywhere, solving the issue of traditional environments where the architecture and underlying infrastructure are too tightly coupled, extending the application development cycle.

Software-defined environment (SDE): An environment in which the whole computing infrastructure, such as compute, storage and network resources, is optimized so that it can adapt to the type of work required, composing workloads from existing components, which are then mapped to the programmable infrastructure.

Software-defined everything: Computing technologies where management and control of the networking, storage, and data center is automated by software rather than by the hardware components of the infrastructure.

Software-defined factory (Manufacturing): Using machine learning, computer vision, and robotics, factory operations become fully programmable and automated.

Software-defined far memory: Sitting in between dynamic random access memory and flash, facilitates the compression of cold in-memory data and its migration to software.

Software-defined firewall: A security design that protects host machines and enables security policy control by abstracting the firewall architecture into control and data planes.

Software-defined flash: A hardware/software storage system that has the performance characteristics of flash memory in the context of workloads, exposing flash channels to the host software, which then organizes data and schedules data access.

Software-defined fog network architecture: Enables data to be managed and analyzed at the network edge, providing support for applications that require very low and predictable latency.

Software-defined gateway: Supports functions, interfaces, and parameters of the software-defined system from the hardware, basic software, and application, acting as a bridge between the digital and physical world, allowing applications to talk to, control, and observe objects in the physical world through a common gateway.

Software-defined hardware: Configurable and programmable SoC optimized for a selected set of applications.

Software-defined intelligence: An approach that integrates compute, storage, networking, security, energy, and IoT with machine learning.

Software-defined interconnect (SD-IX): Delivers security, routing, and automation services to network interconnection points through software without having to deploy individual network appliances for each tenant, achieving co-location network growth.          

Software-defined internet of things (SDIoT): An integration of SDN and IoT considered to be an advancement in computer networking by redefining the network paradigm for communication, ensuring proper operation of IoT services and applications and monitoring the connected IoT devices in the network.

Software-defined internet exchange: A location where multiple networks meet to exchange traffic and BGP routes and web traffic is directed via local exchanges, reducing communication delays.

Software-defined IT operations (SDITO): Automates operations processes to align with policies and cross-functional IT requirements, leveraging automation and a software-driven approach, to handle growing IT management needs in complex infrastructure environments.

Software-defined load balancing: Managed by a control plane, receives and analyzes application data sent by the distributed load balancers to determine service placement and autoscaling for each application.

Software-defined mainframe: A workload re-hosting technology that allows mainframe applications to execute on open systems without requiring conversion of data types.

Software-defined memory: Intersects memory and storage to ensure data safety of in-memory applications, allowing them to run large workloads at lower costs, and traditional storage-based applications to achieve near-memory performance levels.

Software-defined mobile networks (SDMN): A mobile network design featuring all protocol-specific functions implemented in software, maximizing the use of commodity hardware and software in both the main network and radio access network.

Software-defined modem: Replacing or supplementing hardware in a traditional modem, this type of modem uses software on a host computer and its resources, such as the central processing unit, for computing.

Software-defined monitoring (SDM): Necessary for monitoring next-generation networks, transfers network monitoring functions to a software system that works in tune with configurable hardware accelerators through a scheme.

Software-defined NAS: Data storage programs where the storage resources are independent of the underlying physical hardware, allocated to a pool, and distributed to applications and users as needed, with the ability to scale at large.

Software-defined networking: The use of open protocols to apply network control at the edge of a network using software applications.

Software-defined network segmentation: Organizes endpoints into security groups that are based on business requirements using a richer context than an IP address, allowing for easier user comprehension and management.

Software-defined object storage: Computer data storage architecture that manages data as units called objects, instead of as files or blocks, and groups with metadata tags and other unique identifiers.

Software-defined optical networks (SDON): Leverages the flexibility of software-defined network control to support networking applications with an underlying optical network infrastructure.

Software-defined perimeter: An approach to computer security that micro-segments network access, creating direct network connections between users and the resources they infiltrate.

Software-defined power: A software system that combines IT and on-premises systems and automates operating procedures to allocate power across data centers according to workload requirements.

Software-defined quantum communication (SDQC): A methodology that defines how endpoints and functional layers in a quantum communication system configure by creating, modifying, or removing protocols or applications.

Software-defined scale-out NAS: A storage option where new capacity can be added as storage needs increase, avoiding overprovisioning, and offers reduced data center space requirements.

Software-defined storage: Data storage architecture that uses software, instead of hardware dependency, to determine resiliency and performance.     

Software-defined security: Security functions abstracted from hardware to become virtual network functions (VNFs), adding more security layers.

Software-defined telephony network: Telecommunications equipment for electronic relay of voice, fax, or data that transmits speech or other sound between points without the use of wires.

Software-defined transmission control scheme: Working in conjunction with the IP, defines how to conduct and maintain a network conversation while allowing application programs to exchange data. 

Software-defined VANET: A distributed wireless system that enables road safety and traffic management vehicles to communicate with each other through mobile broadband in ad hoc fashion.

Software-defined voice network: A solution for large multi-vendor voice communication networks that decouples the voice network control layer from the voice infrastructure layer to result in centralized network and call routing management. Integrates with new and existing voice applications to optimize network performance and reduce operational costs without having to replace existing voice solutions.

Software-defined WAN: A virtual architecture that allows leverage of transport services, including internet services and multiprotocol label switching, to securely connect users to applications.

Software-defined wifi: A wireless domain that filters higher-level traffic control from underlying packet forwarding to manipulate for traffic prioritization and boosts bit rate and bandwidth.

Software-defined wireless network (SDWN): Flexible network management that separates control and data plane and coordinates access points to allow control of the whole network in a unified way.

Software-defined workloads: Traditional processes redirected to run in a cloud environment that allows for scalability, automated installation and configuration, and virtual deployment.

Software-defined workplace: An adaptable environment made up of interconnected systems allowing the shift of physical tasks to virtual, including networking, storage, compute, and orchestration.

Storage capacity: The amount of disk space provided on a storage device.         

Storage device: Computing hardware used to store and extract data objects and files.

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V

Veeam: An information technology company that specializes in disaster recovery and data management software.

Virtualization: Running a virtual instance of a computer system in a layer abstracted from the actual hardware so that multiple operating systems can be run on a computer system at the same time.

VMware: A software company that provides cloud computing and virtualization software and services.

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