I know this is a broad question, but... I now have the need for a SAN rather than NFS servers. I've been playing with glusterfs for a few days and like what I see so for. My problem is I don't want to spend weeks redoing what I'm sure some of you have already done, i.e. optimizing the myriad of configuration/design possibilities provided by glusterfs for my particular situation. My hope is that by describing my needs, some of you might be able to provide some good suggestions on starting points. So here's my use case. I have a very broad range of user applications and new ones being added everyday. Some users are sophisticated and can tailor their applications to use the file system optimally with input from me, others are not and do very inefficient things. I need to be able to service them all as best as possible. And therefore need good performance on the broadest range of file server scenarios. I currently have O(100) client nodes and need room for O(1000) in the near future. I have Gb ethernet and do not plan on changing that. Though I am open to the idea of a separate network for storage. Here's what I want. I require high-availability (afr?), better than NFS performance, scalability to O(1000) clients, and the ability to dynamically increase/decrease my storage capacity. I'm pretty sure glusterfs can provide that, I'm just not sure how I should start or what are the most import factors to consider. Rather than tainting the discussion with specific questions, I'll just ask you for your thoughts. Thanks for your help. Kevin
