BIRDS-OF-A-FEATHER SESSIONS

Lead or attend a BoF! Meet with your peers! Present new work! Don't miss these special activities designed to maximize the value of your time at the conference. The always popular evening Birds-of-a-Feather sessions are very informal gatherings of persons interested in a particular topic.

Vendor BoFs
Want to demonstrate a new product or discuss your company's latest technologies with FAST attendees? Host a Vendor BoF! These sponsored one-hour sessions give companies a chance to talk about products and proprietary technology—and they include promotional benefits. Email sponsorship@usenix.org if you're interested in sponsoring a Vendor BoF. Click here for more information about sponsorship opportunities.

Scheduling a BoF
To schedule a BoF, simply write the BoF title as well as your name and affiliation on one of the BoF Boards located in the registration area. If you have a description of our BoF you'd like posted on this Web page, please schedule your BoF on the BoF board, then send its title, the organizer's name and affiliation, and the date, time, and location of the BoF to bofs@usenix.org with "FAST '10 BoF" in the subject line.

BoF Schedule (as of February 25, 2010)
For the most current schedule, please see the BoF Boards in the registration area.

BoF Descriptions

Panel Discussion and Beer Social BoF
From the Sandbox to the Data Center: What it Takes to Bring Data Storage Innovations to Market
Jacob Farmer, Cambridge Computer
Wednesday, February 24, 7:30 p.m.–9:30 p.m., Belvedere

So, you've dreamed up a brilliant new algorithm or maybe you have designed the storage architecture of the future. How do you bring to market a data storage solution that people actually use? Come discuss the trials and tribulations of pulling together a team, developing the product, raising capital, winning over customers, and building a sustainable business. Our panelists are people who have had the visions and taken the risks. Some hit home runs; others got stuck in the mud; others are still pursuing the dream. 

pNFS and NFSv4.1 after RFC Approval and the Road ahead
Sorin Faibish, EMC Corporation
Wednesday, February 24, 7:30 p.m.–8:30 p.m., Atherton

With the aproval of the RFC 5661 - 5664 the NFSv4 minor version 1 and all 3 pNFS protocols are becoming full IETF standard. The time has come for vendors to embrace and support the new protocol. But the work is not yet finished as there are many more enhancements that are needed. This BoF will discuss the current status of the pNFS implementations in Linux, Windows and Solaris and try to find ways to accelerate the adoption of pNFS. We will also try to dicuss new requirements for NFSv4.2 as well as less known proposed enhancement drafts. (slides)

Building a Storage Stack for 1 Billion+ People: The Reality Vendor BoF
Wednesday, February 24, 8:30 p.m.–9:30 p.m., Atherton

Join members of the Windows Storage teams for a lively discussion about building a storage platform that satisfies the needs of Billions of consumers and enterprises.

HPC Storage
Peter Honeyman, CITI, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Wednesday, February 24, 9:30 p.m.–10:30 p.m., Atherton

Federated Namespace Applications and Protocols
James Lentini, NetApp
Thursday, February 25, 7:30 p.m.–8:30 p.m., Atherton

We will discuss applications of a federated namespace and the protocols being standardized in the IETF's NFSv4 Working Group that enable them. These open, portable protocols permit the construction of a cross-platform, federated file system namespace accessible to unmodified NFSv4 clients.

Trace Collection, Storage, and Replay
Geoff Kuenning, Harvey Mudd College and SNIA
Thursday, February 25, 7:30 p.m.–8:30 p.m., Cupertino

Traces continue to be an essential tool for studying file systems. In this BoF, we will discuss techniques for collecting, storing, disseminating, analyzing, and replaying traces. If you have trace problems, bring them to this BoF and share your solutions.

Dispersed Storage and Academic Dispersed Storage Network Initiative
Jason Resch, Cleversafe, Inc.
Thursday, February 25, 8:30 p.m.–9:30 p.m., Atherton

We will introduce dispersed storage technology and discuss approaches for standardization within the scope of cloud storage services. Dispersed storage is a technique which uses erasure codes to provide redundancy and geographic dispersion as an alternative to multi-site replication. Additionally, we are seeking parties interested in participating in an inter-organizational dispersed storage network comprised of academic and research institutions.
http://www.cleversafe.com/company/academic-dsnet

A 1000 Node Emulab Service: Do You Want It?
Garth Gibson, CMU/Panasas; James Nunez, LANL
Thursday, February 25, 8:30 p.m.–9:30 p.m., Cupertino

Los Alamos National Laboratory is proposing to NSF that it refurbish and make available for use by academics very large (e.g. 1000 nodes), recently retired, commodity clusters.  And to manage these using the familiar Emulab software.  This could be raw hardware, so all software can be replaced, possibly allocated for dedicated use for days at a stretch, and it could come with something like 25% spare parts, so destructive fault injection (ie, hammer-tolerant distributed systems) could be possible. Come talk to us about your interest in having access to such a resource.