Have you even tried to translate computer jargon into real language an ordinary person can
understand? It’s almost impossible! It is almost like computer junkies don’t want us commoners
know what they are discussing. Take, for instance, a storage area network. Since I don’t know
anything about this topic, I decide to search the Internet for information. My results include
mention of information likely written in a foreign language.

Not to pick on Wikipedia, but their definition was the first one I came across. All the others I
found were just about as bad when describing storage area networks. According to Wikipedia,
“In computing, a Storage Area Network (SAN) is an architecture to attach remote computer
storage devices such as disk array controllers, tape libraries and CD arrays to server in such a
way that to the operating system the devices appear as locally attached devices…By contrast to a
SAN, Network Attached Storage (NAS), uses file-based protocols such as NFS or SMB/CIFS
where it is clear that the storage is remote, and computers request a portion of an abstract file
rather than a disk block.”

What? I think I know less about what a SAN or storage area network is than before I read the
definition. I guess there needs to be a special dictionary published just for computer jargon.
Especially when they borrow another word commonly used to mean something else. This
definition calls a storage area network an architecture. When I think of architecture, I
automatically bring to mind a particular building style, like Tudor architecture. Who would have
ever guessed you could also use the term architecture to describe how you build a computer
system. Would you like your Apple Macbook Pro with Tudor architecture or Victorian
architecture? Sorry, but I had to look this term up to find what it meant in computer jargon.
Should you have to look up the definition of a definition?

The next thing that bothers me about computer definitions is the number of acronyms they use. If
I don’t know what something means and have to look up a definition, I probably also don’t know
what the acronyms stand for. Spell them out, please! For instance, what is NSF? How about
SMB/CIFS? For all I know, they’re contagious diseases.

I guess it just goes to show there is a part of the brain that thinks like a computer. Like most other
talents, you either have it or you don’t. While one person can read the definition of a storage area
network and come away with a clear idea of what the term means, some of us just can’t wrap our
brains around the idea.

What I gather from what I have read is that a Storage Area Network is the hardware and software
that makes the Storage Area Network architecture work. If you do not configure and connect the
SAN properly, there is no connectivity between other systems.

By: Marvin Cains