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easyCloud Engineer interview question

Compare block, object and file storage in the cloud. Give a use case for each.

What the interviewer wants to hear

  • Block storage: raw volumes attached to one server, like EBS or Azure Managed Disks
  • Object storage: objects with keys via HTTP API, like S3 or GCS, very durable and cheap
  • File storage: shared file systems over NFS or SMB, like EFS or Azure Files
  • Use cases: databases on block, backups and media on object, shared content on file
  • Cost, performance and access pattern drive the choice

Model answer

Block storage gives a server a raw disk volume, such as EBS on AWS or Managed Disks on Azure. It has low latency and is formatted with a file system by the OS, so it suits databases and boot volumes, but usually only one instance uses it. Object storage, such as S3 or Google Cloud Storage, stores whole objects under keys and is accessed over an HTTP API. It is extremely durable, scales without limits and is cheap, so it is ideal for backups, logs, data lakes, images and static websites, but you cannot edit part of a file in place. File storage, such as EFS or Azure Files, gives a shared file system over NFS or SMB that many servers can mount at once, which fits shared content, home directories or legacy apps that expect file paths. I choose based on access pattern, performance and cost.

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