Announcing: A Two-Part Deep Dive on the IBM Storage Ceph Object Gateway (RGW)

This new two-part series explores the architecture and internal data structures of the Ceph Object Gateway (RGW). We move from high-level components to the underlying data representation, including multipart uploads and data inlining.

Part 1: Architecture and Scalability Solutions.

Part 1 details how the IBM Storage Ceph Object Gateway is architected to address the key scalability challenges faced by other storage systems.

• The Concurrency Problem: Discover how the Beast frontend manages thousands of simultaneous connections without performance degradation.

• The Slow Listing Problem: We analyze the OMAP-based index to reveal why your storage media choice for certain pools has a critical impact on listing speed.

• The "Hot Bucket" Problem: A deep look at Dynamic Resharding as an automated solution to prevent performance bottlenecks in buckets with billions of objects.

• RGW Data Placement: An overview of the specialized RGW RADOS pools, clarifying exactly where RGW metadata and data reside in your cluster.

Read Part 1: https://community.ibm.com/community/user/blogs/daniel-alexander-parkes/2025/10/23/ibm-storage-ceph-object-storage-deep-dive-series-p

Part 2: Data Internals and Advanced Management This article examines the complex data management operations that are crucial to efficiency and reliability.

• Metadata Layout Explained: A clear breakdown of RGW's metadata, showing where user, bucket, and policy information is stored and how to inspect it safely.

• The Head/Tail Data Model: Explore the internal data model that allows RGW to be highly efficient for both small files and massive, multi-terabyte objects.

• Multipart Upload Internals: Understand how Multipart Upload is designed as a near-instantaneous, metadata-only commit that avoids performance penalties for large file writes.

• Automated Background Operations: A deep dive into Garbage Collection and Lifecycle processes that ensure data is managed and space is reclaimed efficiently without manual intervention.

Read Part 2: https://community.ibm.com/community/user/blogs/daniel-alexander-parkes/2025/10/24/ibm-storage-ceph-object-storage-deep-dive-series-p

This series provides foundational knowledge for Storage Architects and SREs working with Ceph Object Storage.

Adding a new entry: 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 3 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐈𝐁𝐌 𝐒𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐂𝐞𝐩𝐡 𝐎𝐛𝐣𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐒𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐃𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐃𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐋𝐢𝐯𝐞!

This time, we're diving into S3 Object Versioning and Object Lock.
What's covered:

- 𝐕𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐬: How every PUT creates an immutable record, delete markers, and recovery strategies
- 𝐎𝐛𝐣𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐋𝐨𝐜𝐤 & 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐌: Governance vs. Compliance modes, retention periods, and Legal Hold for litigation scenarios
- 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐎𝐛𝐣𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐋𝐨𝐠𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐇𝐞𝐚𝐝 (𝐎𝐋𝐇): The internal architecture that makes versioning efficient.
- 𝐑𝐞𝐠𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐢𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞: Cohasset Associates' third-party validation for SEC 17a-4, FINRA, and CFTC requirements
- 𝐎𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬: Storage planning for full-copy versions, bucket index sharding limits, and MFA Delete configuration

Check it out: https://community.ibm.com/community/user/blogs/daniel-alexander-parkes/2025/12/11/ibm-storage-ceph-object-storage-deep-dive-3