Google Cloud has recently introduced a new feature, Cloud Storage bucket relocation, designed to simplify the process of moving data buckets to different geographical locations without disrupting applications significantly.
The way this feature works is that the name of the bucket and all associated object metadata will remain unchanged during the relocation process. This means there will be no alterations to paths, ensuring that applications experience minimal downtime while the storage is being moved. Additionally, the objects will retain their original storage class (such as Standard, Nearline, Coldline, or Archive) and will keep their time-in-class in the new location. This meticulous preservation is crucial for maintaining established data governance, ensuring the continued operation of object lifecycle management rules, and simplifying application integration, as no changes to access paths or configurations are required after migration.
The new bucket relocation capability is integrated within Google Cloud’s Storage Intelligence suite, working alongside tools like Storage Insights, which offer deep visibility into storage landscapes and identify optimization opportunities. Vaibhav Khunger, a senior product manager, Google Cloud, explains the synergy:
Bucket relocation then lets you act on these insights, and move your data between diverse Cloud Storage locations — regional locations for low latency, dual-regions for high availability and disaster recovery, or multi-regions for global accessibility.
Bucket relocation employs two key techniques: asynchronous data copy and metadata preservation. The asynchronous data copy enables data transfer in the background, minimizing disruptions to ongoing operations such as writing, reading, and updating. On the other hand, Metadata preservation ensures that all associated information, including storage class, bucket, and object names, timestamps, access control permissions, and custom metadata, is seamlessly transferred without alteration. This approach reduces risks and overhead typically involved in manual migrations, allowing applications to function without modifications, as the bucket name remains unchanged throughout the process.
Abdel Shiouar, a Google senior cloud developer advocate, comments on LinkedIn:
While Google Cloud Storage had a transfer service for a while, it did not help moving and preserving some metadata (lifecycle for example). The relocation feature is an industry unique non-disruptive bucket migrations tool that syncs up the source and destination and help move metadata including any custom ones.
While the non-disruptive nature of bucket relocation offers significant advantages, some early community discussions have highlighted potential considerations regarding its pricing model and administrative overhead for certain organizational structures. A Reddit user commented:
Definitely neat, but the list of billed items is unfortunate (per GiB for the relocation, per GiB for egress, per GiB for replication, class A operation per object, Management hub subscription per million objects). Granted, the delta between do-it-yourself and this is the per GiB for relocation and the Management hub subscription, but that per GiB for relocation will add up quickly and management hub being a per org subscription could trip things up bureaucratically – e.g., if I’m in a product team I’ll need to hunt down the org admin to turn on management hub and then ensure they set it up to only include my bucket so we don’t get hit with a potentially huge bill and only then can I relocate my bucket… It’s just unfortunate.
Lastly, users can learn more through the bucket relocation documentation and the Storage Intelligence overview.
