1 An End-to-End Approach to Globally Scalable Network Storage

This is a position paper on applying the principles of the end-to-end approach to network storage. While it may seem to be a contradiction to end-to-end arguments to consider putting storage in the network, we argue that not only is there no contradiction, but that adherence to end-to-end principles is the key to achieving true scalability of shared storage. We discuss end-to-end arguments with respect to several properties of network storage, and then describe the Internet Backplane Protocol and the exNode, which are tools that have been designed to create a network storage fabric that adheres to end-to-end principles. The name for this approach is Logistical Networking, and we believe it is fundamental to achieve truly scalable communication. 1