Home > APEX > Storage > White Papers > Introduction to APEX File Storage for AWS > Architecture
APEX File Storage for AWS is a software-defined cloud file storage service that combines the power of OneFS distributed file system with the flexibility and scalability of cloud infrastructure. It is a fully customer-managed service that is designed to meet the needs of enterprise-scale file workloads running on AWS. The architecture of APEX File Storage for AWS is built on the OneFS distributed file system. This architecture uses multiple cluster nodes to establish a single global namespace. Each cluster node operates as an instance of the OneFS software, running on an AWS EC2 instance to deliver storage capacity and compute resources. It is worth noting that the network bandwidth limit at the EC2 instance level is shared between the cluster internal network and the external network.
APEX File Storage for AWS uses cloud-native technologies and leverages the elasticity of cloud infrastructure, so that you can easily scale the storage infrastructure as your business requirements grow. It can dynamically scale storage capacity and performance to meet changing demands by adding additional cluster nodes without disruption, enabling the storage infrastructure to scale in a more cost-effective and efficient manner. To guarantee the durability and resiliency of data, APEX File Storage for AWS distributes data across multiple nodes within the cluster. It also uses advanced data protection techniques such as erasure coding and provides features such as SyncIQ to ensure that data is available. Even in the event of one or more node failures, the data remains accessible from the remaining cluster nodes.
Figure 1 shows the technical architecture of APEX File Storage for AWS.
Overall, APEX File Storage for AWS offers a powerful and flexible scale-out file storage solution that can help you improve data management, optimize costs, and achieve scalability and security in a cloud-based environment.