SNIA Cloud Interoperability Conformance Test Program

The Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA), announced the launch of a Cloud Data Management Interface (CDMI) Conformance Test Program (CTP),that validates cloud products’ conformance to the ISO/IEC CDMI standard for cloud data interoperability (ISO catalog number ISO/IEC 17826:2012).

Cloud solutions that pass the CDMI CTP offer cloud consumers assurance that the CDMI standard has been properly implemented and that data stored in any conformant implementationwill be transportable to any other conformant implementation.

CDMI Adoption Growing
The CDMI standard is applicable to all types of clouds – private, public and hybrid – allowing IT departments and end users the freedom to operate between multiple clouds with an ISO/IEC approved standard for storage, migration and security. Adoption of this ISO/IEC interoperability standard is growing rapidly with more than 20 implementations currently embracing CDMI.

As enterprises increasingly deploy cloud-based solutions, cloud interoperability has become a critical business issue. IT departments understand the value of being able to utilize metadata in the cloud to ensure data protection and data portability – providing end users with a guaranteed ‘exit strategy’ for their data in the cloud. This is valuable if organizations want to change cloud service providers or if a cloud service provider goes out of business. As a result, IT departments are expecting suppliers to comply with standards for cloud data interoperability.

Growing Mandate for Cloud Interoperability
The CDMI CTP tests for conformance against the CDMI specification and reassures cloud consumers that CDMI has been consistently implemented for multi-solution interoperably. IT departments with solutions that are CTP certified have the assurance of storage interoperability across a range of cloud storage solutions. The CTP ensures compliance with the ISO/IEC version (1.0.2) of the SNIA CDMI standard, an increasing regulatory compliance requirement for vendors selling solutions to government bodies. The CDMI CTP also offers CIOs return on their technology investmentsas it helps them avoid issues like cloud vendor lock-in and reduces costs to exit contracts with cloud providers.

“SNIA continues to developand promote industry standards to help interoperable use of storage technologies,” said David Dale, SNIA’s COB. “When it comes to cloud storage, we are seeing vendors increasingly adopt the SNIA CDMI standard because end users want to control the destiny of their data and ensure hassle-free data access, data protection and data migration from one cloud service to another.”

“Today, the cloud market is crowded with a slew of vendors offering different solutions for migration, data management and security, often leaving IT customers confused about the right solution for their requirements,” said Greg Schulz, founder of StorageIO, a storage technology advisory and consulting firm. “SNIA’s CDMI Conformance Test Program is a great step forward helping IT customers, VARs or others in the industry navigate their way through the fog of cloud interoperability requirements in a streamlined fashion, not to mention laying standard routes vendors will want to adopt going forward.”

Tata Consultancy Services Limited (TCS), a global IT services, consulting and business solutions organization, will oversee execution of the CTP program. It offers as automated testing suite compliant with the SNIA CDMI Conformance Test Program and TCS’ mature test framework.

“TCS,through its strong customer focus and innovative solutions, is a leader in storage services and is committed to storage standards that benefit the end user,” said Reena Dayal Yadav, global head technology, domain and innovation  for hitech, TCS. “The SNIA CDMI CTP that TCS administers is supported by the TCS’ CDMI Conformance Assurance Solution (CAS). The CAS solution offers complete testing support for cloud storage products’conformance for the CDMI specification, reducing test cycle time and helping organizations fix defects early on to achieve improved product quality and faster time to market.”

SNIA Conformance Test Programs  
SNIA has a track record of ensuring industry standard verification by offering Conformance Test Programs for storage management through the Storage Management Initiative – Specification SMI-S and for storage security through the Storage Security Industry Forum (SSIF) with its Key Management Interoperability Protocol (KMIP). The KMIP Conformance Test Program addresses standardizing communication between encryption systems that need to consume keys and the key management systems that create and manage those keys. SMI-S is an international standard that standardizes and streamlines storage management functions into a common set of tools. SMI-S has been implemented in over 500 products.