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Understanding Clone Operation Benefits

Cloning provides several benefits.

  • Runs fast - Unlike today's large, multi-TB drive copies, which can take many minutes or hours to complete, the ThinkAgile CP Clone and Attach technology allows even the largest disks to be cloned in a matter of seconds.

  • Reduces costs - A clone uses a small amount of space for metadata, and then only consumes additional space as data is changed or added. As a result, the ThinkAgile CP Clone and Attach feature can cut the storage you need for dev/test or virtual environments by 50% or more.

  • Supports business continuity - ThinkAgile CP Clone and Attach makes it possible to clone and fully test your DR processes, or use your DR environment for dev/test without interfering with ongoing replication. You simply clone your DR copies and do dev/test on the clones.

  • Improves quality of dev/test - Make as many copies of your full production data as you need. If there are 20 users, give each user their own clone if you wish. If a test corrupts the data, start again in seconds. Developers and test engineers spend less time waiting for access to datasets and more time doing productive work.

  • Accelerates server and virtual desktop provisioning - Deploy tens or hundreds of new instances in minutes with only a small incremental increase in storage directly from our application templates.

An important use case for clones is malware analysis in a VDI environment. By using the ThinkAgile CP API, active instances' disks can be cloned and attached to an instance with malware software installed that does scanning for vulnerabilities. The clone can then be deleted. This is accomplished during normal business operations and without disrupting the production instance.