Fusion services

IBM Fusion Service provides scalable, integrated storage and data management solutions optimized for hybrid cloud and AI workloads on Red Hat® OpenShift®.

IBM Fusion supports preferred storage class selection during service installation by allowing each service to define an ordered list of storage classes in its FSD. The IBM Fusion UI reads this list, automatically selects the preferred storage class that exists in the cluster, and proceeds with installation without user input. If none of the preferred storage classes are available, the UI enables manual selection and records the user’s choice in the service FSD.

The available services in IBM Fusion are as follows:

Global Data Platform

The Global Data Platform in IBM Fusion is a unified data management solution that simplifies access, sharing, and management of data across diverse environments. It offers scalable storage optimized for hybrid cloud and AI workloads, ensuring seamless data availability and mobility across multiple locations. It is a software-defined file and object storage that enables organizations to build a global data platform for artificial intelligence (AI), high-performance computing (HPC), advanced analytics, and other demanding workloads.

The Global Data Platform storage type provides the following features:
  • File storage
  • High availability via capacity-efficient erasure coding
  • Metro and regional disaster recovery
  • CSI snapshot support with built-in application consistency
  • Encryption at rest
  • Ability to mount file systems hosted by remote IBM Storage Scale clusters.
Important: IBM Fusion Access for Storage Area Network (SAN), Global Data Platform, and Content-Aware Storage are mutually exclusive services. If IBM Fusion Access for SAN is planned or installed, you cannot deploy the Global Data Platform or Content-Aware Storage services. Review your architectural requirements and deployment goals before installing these services.

Fusion Data Foundation

You can use Fusion Data Foundation as storage service in IBM Fusion. It enables you to manage Fusion Data Foundation services, and to deploy and scale storage clusters. The Fusion Data Foundation storage type provides the following features:
  • Block, file, and object storage
  • High availability through automatic data replication
  • Metro and regional disaster recovery
  • CSI snapshot support
  • Encryption at rest
For more information about Fusion Data Foundation service, see Introduction to Fusion Data Foundation.
Important: In environments running Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.21 or later and Fusion Data Foundation 4.21 or later, you can configure IBM Fusion Access for SAN in Fusion Data Foundation as an external system only if Global Data Platform and Content-Aware Storage services are not installed. These services are mutually exclusive services. Before planning or deploying IBM Fusion Access for SAN, ensure that your environment does not include Global Data Platform or Content-Aware Storage services.

Backup & Restore

The Backup & Restore service provides the following features:
  • Policy-driven backup of applications that run on Red Hat OpenShift
  • Change block detection for Ceph RBD block volumes. It greatly reduces backup times for applications using block mode volumes, including OpenShift Virtualization VMs based on RBD block volumes.
  • Orchestration of application consistent online backups through recipes
  • Multi-cluster Backup & Restore by using a hub and spoke topology
The Backup & Restore provides application-centric backup and data recovery. To know more about the service and its architecture, see Backup & Restore overview.

IBM Data Cataloging

The IBM Data Cataloging provides data insight for exabyte-scale heterogeneous file, object, backup, and archive storage on premises and in the cloud. The software easily connects to these data sources to rapidly ingest, consolidate, and index metadata for billions of files and objects. For more information about the IBM Data Cataloging service and its architecture, see Data Cataloging.

Content-Aware Storage (CAS)

It leverages natural language processing (NLP) and AI technologies to extract semantic meaning from unstructured data, such as text, charts, graphs, and images. It allows for more efficient data retrieval and integration with AI workflows, particularly in retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) processes. For more information about the CAS service, see Content-Aware Storage (CAS).
Important: IBM Fusion Access for Storage Area Network (SAN), Global Data Platform, and Content-Aware Storage are mutually exclusive services. If IBM Fusion Access for SAN is planned or installed, you cannot deploy the Global Data Platform or Content-Aware Storage services. Review your architectural requirements and deployment goals before installing these services.