Object Tiering

Object tiering is the moving of the data of an object from one set of hardware to another set of hardware. This is often done as a cost-saving measure, keeping more expensive and performant hardware for the newest or most accessed objects while placing other objects to less expensive and less performant storage solutions.

When AIStor moves an object to another tier, the object’s metadata remains on the primary tier while the object’s data moves to the secondary tier. When AIStor needs to serve a tiered object, it transparently retrieves the object from the secondary tier.

Users can temporarily restore an object to the primary tier by returning its data there for a fixed span of time using the AIStor client’s mc ilm restore command. After the specified time passes, AIStor automatically returns the object to the secondary tier. AIStor does not support permanently restoring an object to the primary tier.

AIStor supports a single level of tiering, with a primary and secondary level of storage. For example, a “hot” storage and a “warm” storage.

AIStor does not support moving objects from the secondary tier to yet another level, such as from a warm storage to a deeper “cold” storage for long term archival.

Secondary tiers can be any of the following types of storage:

• Another AIStor Object Store
• S3-compatible storage
• Azure Cloud Storage
• Google Cloud Storage