Talks by Andrew Gaul

Apache jclouds at Maginatics

jclouds meetup 2014, slides, video

How Maginatics used Apache jclouds and architected MagFS to achieve broad blobstore portability and high scalability for the Maginatics Cloud Storage Platform, a cloud-optimized NAS filer.

Cloud storage with Apache jclouds

ApacheCon EU 2014, slides

Object stores provide a flexible, scalable, and cost-effective abstraction to build applications in both the public and private cloud. Apache jclouds abstracts all major providers, allowing Java source-level compatibility while providing access to vendor-specific interfaces. This talk will cover how to integrate jclouds into applications and how to manage containers and objects. It will also discuss differences between providers, scaling out the number of clients and number of objects, and trade-offs in application design.

Exploring trade-offs in S3 file systems

Ohio LinuxFest 2020, slides, video

Many Linux user-space file systems (FUSE) layer on top of S3 (Amazon Simple Storage Service) to allow existing applications to use scalable storage without rewriting. These work well for many applications but for others compare unfavorably to NFS. Performance of some operations can differ an order of magnitude while other operations cannot be implemented at all. In this talk, we explore the trade-offs between s3fs, goofys, and s3ql including performance, interoperability, and POSIX compatibility.

Introduction to S3Proxy and SwiftProxy

OpenStack Summit 2015, slides, video

S3Proxy and SwiftProxy provide S3 and Swift frontends to cloud storage applications. They can translate to other backends such as EMC Atmos, Google Cloud Storage, and Microsoft Azure via Apache jclouds. This protocol-agnostic foundation provides a base for new middlewares, e.g., authentication, caching, encryption, quotas, and tiering.

Maintaining an open source project while sustaining your sanity

Open Source Summit Japan 2021, slides, video

Many open source projects rely on one or a few maintainers which risks burnout and abandonment. This talk explores how maintainers can sustain their projects over the long term without doing all the work themselves. We will discuss how to productively engage users and manage their expectations, how to limit project scope and work with your contributors, and interactions with external projects and communities.

Re-introduction to s3fs

Linux.conf.au 2021, slides, video

S3 file systems are a popular interface to object storage despite their leaky abstractions and performance pitfalls. In this talk we will explore s3fs, one of the most popular FUSE file systems, and when it is an appropriate solution. We will compare it with NFS and also discuss how s3fs has evolved over the last ten years.