Object Storage

Dropbox, Google Drive, Amazon Web Services, yadda yadda are all object storage systems that allow access to data and metadata anywhere on networks open or closed. Commercial services are freemium, and consequently a lot of features are exclusive and we have less choice on the fate of our information .

Yay Open Source! Openstack is an open-source project building a free cloud computing platform. In class, we are going to use OpenStack’s Object Storage Service SwiftStack. SwiftStack is an open source organization with extensive contributions that extend it to new interfaces, authorization services, modules for programming, scientific computing benchmarks…

SwiftStack scales!

SwiftStack has an intuitive API with diverse applications in scientific computing or web application development. You can do a lot of cool things with SwiftStack:

  • Header calls can contain user-defined metadata
  • Handles Small and Large Files
  • Containers and blobs can be versioned
  • Sharing files can exist from never to forever
  • Automated back-up
  • Federation
  • Combination with other OpenStack features for Authenication and Computing

SwiftStack on Storm

Georgia Tech College of Engineering hosts an instance of SwiftStack available to Georgia Tech students and faculty via your Georgia Tech credentials. The bare-bones SwiftStack web console is not usable, don’t try right now. We’ll use some third party clients to interact more efficiently.

Swift/Open Stack Clients

Below are two free clients to manage your SwiftStack accounts and objects. Download your respective client and input the required credentials listed below.

Mac/Windows Users :: Cyberduck

  • Create a new bookmark so you only have to do this once

  • In the top drop down menu choose OpenStack Swift(SWauth)

    You may need to install the OpenStack Swift(SWauth) profile for HTTPS. Download Profile. After you download the profile you should have access to SWauth which authenticates SwiftStack independent of OpenStack’s Keystone Authentication service.

    UPDATE: How to Use SwiftStack on Cyberduck

  • Create an alias for this connection in Nickname
  • Fill in the rest of the credentials
  • You may be prompted for a password with is GATech password.

Windows Users :: CloudBerry

  • Click file > OpenStack
  • Add a new account
  • Set an alias in Display Name
  • Fill in the rest of the credentials
  • Make sure Authentication Service is unchecked.
  • You may be prompted for a password with is GATech password.

A how-to on CloudBerry from Rob Daly.

Credentials

Server

swift.storm.gatech.edu
Website URL

https://swift.storm.gatech.edu
Authentication Service

swift.storm.gatech.edu/auth/v1.0
Port

443
User name

GATech User name
API/Secret Key

GATech PW

GT folks do not use Keystone Authorization

Other Services

  • ExpandDrive - ExpandDrive will cost you money to save time and effort in aggregating your cloud services. It plugs into most cloud services effortlessly and integrates them as drives on your local machine. You won’t even notice your data is floating in space.

  • Python-SwiftClient - This is the API for Python.

    Please visit this Notebook to see how both this Post and the Python-SwiftClient can be use to load information directly from your SwiftStack account.