> This is a bit off-topic...but since the Thumper is the poster child > for ZFS I hope its not too off-topic. > > What are the actual origins of the Thumper? I've heard varying stories > in word and print. It appears that the Thumper was the original server > Bechtolsheim designed at Kealia as a massive video server.
That's correct -- it was originally called the StreamStor. Speaking personally, I first learned about it in the meeting with Andy that I described here: http://blogs.sun.com/bmc/entry/man_myth_legend I think it might be true that this was the first that anyone in Solaris had heard of it. Certainly, it was the first time that Andy had ever heard of ZFS. It was a very high bandwidth conversation, at any rate. ;) After the meeting, I returned post-haste to Menlo Park, where I excitedly described the box to Jeff Bonwick, Bill Moore and Bart Smaalders. Bill said something like "I gotta see this thing" and sometime later (perhaps the next week?) Bill, Bart and I went down to visit Andy. Andy gave us a much more detailed tour, with Bill asking all sorts of technical questions about the hardware (many of which were something like "how did you get a supplier to build that for you?!"). After the tour, Andy took the three of us to lunch, and it was one of those moments that I won't forget: Bart, Bill, Andy and I sitting in the late afternoon Palo Alto sun, with us very excited about his hardware, and Andy very excited about our software. Everyone realized that these two projects -- born independently -- were made for each other, that together they would change the market. It was one of those rare moments that reminds you why you got into this line of work -- and I feel lucky to have shared in it. - Bryan -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bryan Cantrill, Solaris Kernel Development. http://blogs.sun.com/bmc _______________________________________________ zfs-discuss mailing list zfs-discuss@opensolaris.org http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/zfs-discuss
