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Storage Area Network

  • Reference work entry
Encyclopedia of Database Systems

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Synonyms

SAN

Definition

A Storage Area Network is a network whose main purpose is to transfer data between storage devices and servers and among storage devices. The term Storage Area Network can be a synonym of the term Storage Network, but differs in that the term Storage Area Network is usually identified with a network with block-level I/O services rather than file access services. More specifically, the term Storage Area Network is often used to refer to a network with Fiber Channel technology. However, SNIA released a more general definition in which the term Storage Area Network is not connected with any specific types of network connections. Under this definition, an Ethernet-based network infrastructure for mainly connecting storage devices could also be considered a Storage Area Network. The term Storage Area Network is often abbreviated to SAN. When the term SAN is used in connection with a specific network technology X, the use of a term “X SAN” is encouraged. A SAN based...

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Recommended Reading

  1. Clark T. Designing Storage Area Networks: A Practical Reference for Implementing Fibre Channel and IP SANs. Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 2003.

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  2. Storage Network Industry Association. The Dictionary of Storage Networking Terminology. Also available at: http://www.snia.org/.

  3. Troppens U., Erkens R., and Müller W. Storage Networks Explained. Wiley, New York, 2004.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan

    Kazuo Goda

Authors
  1. Kazuo Goda
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. College of Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, 266 Ferst Drive, 30332-0765, Atlanta, GA, USA

    LING LIU (Professor) (Professor)

  2. Database Research Group David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue West, N2L 3G1, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. TAMER ÖZSU (Professor and Director, University Research Chair) (Professor and Director, University Research Chair)

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© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC

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Goda, K. (2009). Storage Area Network. In: LIU, L., ÖZSU, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-39940-9_1329

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