logo
logo
Sign in

Technology Advancements are Enabling Composable Infrastructure

avatar
Purvaja
Technology Advancements are Enabling Composable Infrastructure

What is Composable Infrastructure?

Traditional data center infrastructure is rigid and difficult to change. Components like servers, storage, networking gear operate in isolated silos making it challenging to respond quickly to changing business needs. Composable infrastructure takes a different approach. With composable infrastructure, resources are disaggregated and pooled. This means compute, storage, and networking resources are separated from fixed physical servers and can be composed and recomposed on demand through software.

Benefits of flexibility

A Composable Infrastructure provides flexibility that allows IT teams to quickly scale and reallocate resources. Business units can get the infrastructure they need faster without having to go through lengthy procurement cycles. Resources can be combined in multiple configurations automatically through policy-based automation. This level of agility helps organizations keep pace with rapid market changes. Composable infrastructure also improves efficiency by minimizing stranded capacity. Underutilized hardware is returned to pools where other workloads can make use of the unused resources.

Disaggregation enables choice

Traditional infrastructure stacks resources together in fixed servers making changes difficult. Composable models separate these resources allowing different options to be chosen independently. For example, an application could use high-performance CPUs with fast flash storage without being tied to a specific server platform. IT teams gain more control and can choose best-of-breed components from different vendors to assemble optimized solutions. They avoid being locked into proprietary technologies. This level of choice empowers organizations to adopt new technologies like containers or scale-out storage more easily. Resources can also be pooled across multiple application teams providing broader sharing of infrastructure.

Software-defined operations

The composability of infrastructure is realized through extensive use of software-defined capabilities. Low-level resources are abstracted and managed through policy-driven software tools. Hyperconverged infrastructure software allows compute and storage to be pooled and allocated on demand. Container orchestration platforms abstract applications from infrastructure. Microservices architectures modularize applications. Software-defined networking virtualizes and automates network provisioning. Powerful resource schedulers determine optimal placement of workloads. These software layers enable complex infrastructure services to be dynamically assembled, monitored, updated and recomposed without manual interventions. They bring agility, efficiency and choice that has so far eluded traditional infrastructure models.

Operational simplification

Composable infrastructure aims to simplify IT operations through abstraction, automation and orchestration. Infrastructure becomes software-defined and policy-driven. Changes can be made through application programming interfaces (APIs) eliminating tedious manual configuration. Workflows and provisioning become standardized bringing consistency. Failure domains are expanded preventing outages due to single component failures. Troubleshooting is simplified through contextual logging and monitoring across end-to-end stacks. Resource utilization is optimized through automated balancing, load shedding and right sizing. IT staff gain visibility and control enabling proactive management. Resources can be shared across data centers through software-defined capabilities. This boosts operational efficiency by reducing manual tasks and complexity across the infrastructure lifecycle.

Security and compliance advantages

Security challenges in large data centers stem from complex infrastructure and manual change processes. Composable approaches enhance security through standardization, automation and containment. Workloads operate in secure isolated virtual environments instead of relying on perimeter-based defenses. Microservices allow granular authorization and access control preventing lateral threats. Software-defined networking enforces consistent network segmentation across dynamic infrastructure. Compliance with regulations like GDPR becomes simpler through transparent and auditable resource usage reporting. Security driven policies can be readily expressed and enforced across pooled resources lowering risk of exposure from misconfigurations. Incident response is streamlined as changes are documented through APIs and logs provide context across abstraction layers. Overall, embracing composability improves security posture and makes it easier to satisfy regulatory mandates.

Cloud is the Future

While designed for on-premises, composable infrastructure principles increasingly resemble those of modern cloud services. Legacy infrastructure models are not optimized to keep pace with rapidly evolving applications and agile business demands. Composability allows IT to provision internal services with similar speed, scale and agility of public clouds in a cost-effective way. Hybrid cloud capabilities further allow workloads to move seamlessly between on-premises pools and external clouds based on cost and policy optimizations. Over time, remaining functional silos between private and public clouds will dissolve as infrastructure everywhere becomes software-defined and workflow-driven. This will herald the true promise of a cloud-centric future where location becomes irrelevant and IT resources truly become infinite, on-demand composite services delivered over any network.

Composable infrastructure is about liberating IT from rigid constraints through modularity, abstraction and automation. It delivers unprecedented levels of agility, choice, efficiency and simplicity that modern digital businesses demand. Software-defined capabilities are driving the composability revolution transforming how infrastructure will operate to fuel digital transformation well into the future. Organizations that adopt this emerging model will find it easier to adapt inside a rapidly changing technology landscape.

Get more insights on this topic: Composable Infrastructure

collect
0
avatar
Purvaja
guide
Zupyak is the world’s largest content marketing community, with over 400 000 members and 3 million articles. Explore and get your content discovered.
Read more