Interesting take on future file serving.

[Scott Lovenberg]

> On Oct 1, 2015, at 21:47, Simo <simo at samba.org> wrote:
> 
>> On Thu, 2015-10-01 at 10:22 -0700, Jeremy Allison wrote:
>> Really interesting article here:
>> 
>> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/10/01/aspera/
>> 
>> about how local storage could link to
>> cloud storage. Might be a good jump-start
>> for the Samba cloud-storage-gateway discussions.
> 
> It is an interest take, in a way, but nothing really new, it is well
> know that HTTP/TCP is terribly inefficient for file access, let alone
> when we add the S (as in HTTPS) in there.
> HTTP/2 is trying to fix some of that and Google is going bonkers
> experimenting with a new protocol of theirs that is similar to SCTP but
> not quite.
> 
> Unfortunately the bigger issue is not that people are obstinate in
> using HTTP/TCP, the reason why all public networking is bound to
> HTTPS/TCP is ... <trumpets> firewalls.
> 
> Many networks block UDP outright, and some allow exclusively port 80
> and 443, some outrageously firewall those too putting a proxy in
> between and forcing you to use a CA of theirs to intercept HTTPS
> traffic too ...

$largeFinancialClient of ours does that. We tried to explain they were breaking our encrypted connection, but their "head proxy guy" (yes, they have several of those) basically said "corporate policy". Unfortunately we're at an impasse - we won't not encrypt data from our appliance, and they won't not intercept and re-encrypt. 

The moral of the story is that some things (most things, says the INTP software engineer in me - but I don't live in the world everyone else does) aren't technical problems. Don't waste your energy in these arenas. It's kind of the way that the RIAA counts downloads as sales; the truth of the matter in these situations is that some entities will never be consumers of your product and its wasted effort and energy to chase it. 

The pendulum swings and we're due to see local storage become more prevalent, due to dropping costs and other factors IMHO, in the next 3 years I'd think. 

Take this as you will,
I'm stuck in Chicago, at the bar where I've been comped after a missed connection on my way to Pennsylvania. While trying not to ask about GPL violations to the guys at the VMWare conference at the Hyatt. It's been a trying day. When I get back to the Twin Cities I need to hit up Chris and Jose for another geek gathering.