This is what 55TB looks like!

We got our Backblaze Pod from Proto Case but building the system is only half the battle. The real magic is configuring all the software that powers it, and the storage space. Speaking of storage, we at Oxygen Cloud just happened to have over 50 Western Digital 1.5TB Green drives on hand.

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Software Configuration:

The backblaze from Proto Case ships with Debian 5 Squeeze and all the required drives for the system to start. Its up the user to supply the drives and handle configuration. With those 50+ WD Green drives, we decided to go with 3 Raid 6 array using mdadm. With this, we used LVM on top to create one uber-drive.

One hurdle we hit was trying to format this new partition. We’d originally chosen JFS for the filesystem but this caused enough issues that we decided to go with ext4 instead. This presented its’ own problem: ext4 supports up to 1EiB, but the distro copy of e2fsprogs only supported 16TB. Building from source using the 64bit flag solved this.

Unsurprisingly, formatting 50TB is not a fast process. Be prepared to wait a long time.

Bryan Pham, playing Chess as he waits for 55TB to format.

After formatting comes the really hard choice: What do we do with 55TB of storage? NFS? SAMBA? So 90s! What if you’re out with your iPhone, iPad, or Android device and need your data? That’s where Oxygen Storage Connector (codename: Morpheus) comes in!

What is Oxygen Storage Connector? Its software you can deploy on any Windows or Linux machine (OS X coming soon!) that will convert unused storage on a NAS/File Server into storage you can use with Oxygen Cloud so you can access your data anywhere in the world.

This also means your data is encrypted end to end in both transit from your NAS to your device but also at rest on your device and NAS. You can share spaces from your Oxygen Storage Connector with family, friends, co-workers, anyone you choose around the world and they — and only they — will have the ability to see spaces you share with them. Now we at Oxygen Cloud can store all of our data in-house yet leverage the cloud for all of our Metadata allowing us to access it anywhere in the world! With a team that includes members in Pakistan, Indonesia, Hong Kong and the US it’s important they have the ability to put their files on the backblaze from anywhere and one way we allow this is via our Oxygen Tunnel Gateways.

Oxygen Tunnel gateways are servers we’ve deployed that allow you to access your Oxygen Storage Connector behind your firewall when you are outside your firewall, without having to punch any holes or change your configuration.

Oxygen Tunnel Gateways are the magic that allows Oxygen Storage Connector users to access their storage without having to reconfigure their router or firewall. Inside, outside, it doesn’t matter — it just works! How? Magic! It’s also smart enough that when you’re on the local network it will connect directly, allowing the fastest transfer speeds possible.

If you want to learn more about Oxygen Storage Connector and get the software yourself, check out Oxygen Cloud.

EDIT: Our team has created a video montage of us building, configuration and using the backblaze pod.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Received: by mta11g.e.groupon.com (PowerMTA(TM) v3.5r16) id hu7ouq0ie1sl for ZSIDDIQUE@GMAIL.COM; Wed, 21 Dec 2011 08:40:10 -0600 (envelope-from bounce-107228_HTML-686961132-11052402-96988-0@bounce.e.groupon.com) X-Recruiting: Interested in headers? Join us: http://www.groupon.com/techjobs From: "Groupon" mail@e.groupon.com

It’s a cute trick to get people who understand headers to be interested in the company.

Did I forget to mention that we at Oxygen Cloud are hiring, http://www.oxygencloud.com/careers.html

via A brief history of sharing files – YouTube.

If you have a passion to work at a fast moving company, understand the unique demand of supporting a fully automated scalable backend then you are the person for this job!

Go ahead and submit your resume to me zuhaib.siddique oxygencloud.com . You can read the full description of the job here: http://www.oxygencloud.com/careers

A Systems Administrator position here at Oxygen encompasses much, much more than just maintaining some Linux servers. You will be given the the opportunity to work with the latest technologies and tools in order to overcome the real-world challenges that accompany the ambitious goal of bringing Oxygen to the masses. We are looking for very smart, very dedicated individuals that like nothing more than to get their hands dirty addressing scaling, performance, and availability challenges across a vast cloud infrastructure. Passion, skill, and a whole lot of Geek Cred are the attributes we are looking for here. Does 90% of your home electric bill come from powering dozens of gadgets and several Linux boxes? Does your idea of a “fun night” involve opening your wireless access up to your bandwidth stealing neighbors, so that you can invert all of their web content? Do you find that your most common thought on a daily basis is “I’ll just write a script for that”? If so, then we want to talk to you. Role/Responsibilities: Manage the day-to-day operations of Oxygen’s infrastructure to ensure smooth 24×7 operation Work closely with Engineering to ensure proper and timely deployment of software to staging and production environments. Use cutting edge methods and technology to identify and solve problems related to performance, scalability, reliability, and availability Develop, implement, and continually improve upon best practice processes and procedures Skills/Experience: 2-4 years of hard core system administration or technical operations experience Very strong knowledge of Linux system administration practices and troubleshooting. Strong passion for Cloud storage and Cloud computing technologies Experience with Apache, Tomcat, MySQL, and cloud services infrastructures Ability to troubleshoot errors and proactively identify issues Demonstrated ability to generate and maintain technical documentation Bonus Skills: Understanding of MySQL performance characteristics and scaling options Knowledge of systems architecture design and implementation Knowledge of configuration management and automation (Chef, Puppet, etc.) Experience with the following tech: Nginx, Ruby, Python, LDAP/AD, DNS/BIND, SSO, SMTP, NFS, Beanstalk, Memcached, SSL Requirements for applying: Tell us what interests you about this position Tell us about a project that you have significantly contributed to and are very proud of E-mail the above and your resume in PDF format to jobs@oxygencloud.com

mysqldump -P <port#> -h <server ip>-u mysql_user -p database_name table_name > backup.sql

To restore your DB in the cloud you use a more well-known mysql technique

mysql -u mysql_user -p -h <server ip> cloud_db_name < backup.sql

via YouTube – Daft Punk – Derezzed Guitar Cover (Tron).

Looks like the iPhone stores GPS data on you to your local backup (and maybe apple) and you can now view it using iPhoneTracker. Scary and the history mode is even more scary as you can see where you went during a day and its pretty accurate.