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Block Storage and Volumes

There are several ways of handling disk storage in the CERN private cloud.

  • System disks are generally used to store the operating system created from an image when the virtual machine is booted.
  • Volumes are persistent virtualized block devices independent of any particular instance. Volumes can be attached to a single instance at a time, and detached/reattached to a different instance while retaining all data, much like a USB drive. The size of the volume can be selected when it is created within the quota limits for the particular project.

Volumes storage is built upon Ceph and operated by the IT Storage Group.

The Ceph Service makes no additional backups and there is no provision within the service for disaster recovery. Users are therefore responsible for maintaining independent backups of their volumes where they judge it important.

Privacy Policy

Volumes are provided by Ceph, whose Privacy Policy is available here.