Sun Microsystems has announced future plans to leverage the high-speed open interface standard, InfiniBand as part of a next-generation datacentre infrastructure, which includes servers, storage and software technologies.
Sun is a founder and steering committee member of the InfiniBand Trade Association (IBTA).
InfiniBand is a high-speed switch fabric architecture, which offers advanced features for input/output (I/O) interconnects, including a mechanism to share I/O components among many servers. It is designed to create a more efficient way to connect storage, communications networks and server clusters together.
Future InfiniBand platforms include Sun's horizontally scalable blade servers, expected to be released soon, and vertically scalable enterprise servers.
"InfiniBand-equipped blade servers will be just one of Sun's many stepping stones to virtualised computing where previously siloed resources behave like, and are managed as a single, powerful system," comments Tertius Bezuidenhout, national SE manager at Sun Microsystems SA.
Sun ultimately aims to provide a complete platform for the next-generation datacentre - anchored by the Solaris Operating Environment (OE) with significant enhancements in I/0 architecture, systems and network protocol interfaces using remote direct memory access, and N1 (Network 1) for management.
The company also expects applications such as databases, directories, application servers, ERP, CRM and J2EE (Java 2 Enterprise Edition) environments using InfiniBand to show significantly improved performance.
"Companies will benefit from InfiniBand's high speed functionality and its ability to integrate with existing environments while providing improved application performance, scalability, resource utilisation and management capabilities," says Bezuidenhout.
Sun's leading role with the IBTA began in 1999 as one of the seven founders. As a steering committee member, the company participates in all IBTA technical committees and is current co-chair of the Link Working Group and the Marketing Working Group.
Share
Since its inception in 1982, a singular vision - "The Network Is The Computer" - has propelled Sun Microsystems, Inc (Nasdaq: SUNW) to its position as a leading provider of industrial-strength hardware, software and services that make the Net work. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the World Wide Web at http://www.sun.com.
For additional information, join the Sun ONE Inner Circle Program at http://www.sun.com/sunone/innercircle.
For additional information, become a member of the Sun ONE Executive Boardroom Program at http://www.sun.com/sunone/boardroom.
Sun has publications and programs that will help you stay current with technology. Explore the Sun ONE Subscription Centre to find e-mail newsletters and programs that will help with your business needs. http://www.sun.com/sunone/subscribe
Editorial contacts