Seems like it was just yesterday when we announced and released our BlueScale 10.6 software. You remember that one don't you, when we introduced our Global Spare drive, an industry first in tape automation? Innovative, eh... 

But if you don't here's a link to BlueScale, Spectra's library and disk management software. BlueScale delivers a unique and feature-rich approach to tape library management, but don't take my word for it:  

http://www.spectralogic.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=products.showContentAndChildren&CatID=739&src=fly

One sure thing about Spectra is our committment to continuous innovation. BlueScale is a critical asset for Spectra in delivering customer benefits to mature and emerging market segments.

Why do customers care? Well, if you're buying a tape library it's safe to say that your needs and workflows (not to mention data storage volume etc.) may evolve while you own the library.

With on-going BlueScale feature innovation we help customers manage their tape automation proactively as change occurs, that's why continuous innovation is an important consideration for forward-thinking customers.

So what about this next BlueScale (11.0) release, what do you get?

In a nutshell you get more useful features to help you manage your data on tape. 

We've enhanced our media lifecycle management (MLM) capabilities with the ability to verify that a tape cartridge is ready to use - before you use it.  MLM PreScan checks the tape leader alignment, threading and ensure that the tape can be written when your host application needs to use it. 

Rest assured that when you come into the office you won't find that your scheduled job has failed for a trivial, yet commonly experienced, reason.

MLM PostScan has been also been added to ensure that your data on tape is there when you need it.  This is done by performing a background verification pass on your tapes.

MLM PreScan and MLM PostScan fit seamlessly into your operations as part of Spectra's integrated and complete media lifecycle management (MLM) capabilites.

But we're not done yet...we've now extended the easy-to-manage, proactive health status reporting capabilities of MLM to tape drives. 

Drive lifecycle management (DLM) shields customers from some of the complexities of day-to-day tape drive management with proactive, easy-to-read tape drive health status, easy-to-use tape drive verification tests and tape drive usage reports. 

Did I say easy? Did I say innovative?

We live to deliver customer benefits through innovation, watch this space...