Block-level Virtualization: Howfar can we go?

Inthis paper, wepresent ourvision onbuilding large-scale storage systemsfrom commodity components inadatacenter For reasons ofefficiency andflexibility, weadvocate maintaining sophisticated datamanagement functions behind ablock-based interface. Weanticipate that suchaninterface canbecustomized to meetthediverse needs ofend-users andapplications through the extensible storage system architecture that wepropose.