But the best place to start taking control of BLOBs is at their source, where BLOBs can be compressed to their smallest usable form. Find the best usable compression that still allows flexible, timely access to the data that the BLOBs represent. Graphical user interfaces and the general public fascination with multimedia objects mean that BLOBs won't go away. Planning for high network utilization by workgroups pays off handsomely when inventive and creative types get interesting ideas. Reinventing network response is one of the most expensive of network costs.
Standards are crucial.
Although localized networks can stand a bit of anarchy, there are problems in sending incompatible formats through an enterprise network, where a third format is often created as an intermediate data type. This leads to a problem called Alice's Restaurant Syndrome, where everyone has lots of storage space and never needs to take out the trash until the area reeks of rotting data. Then you may need to call in a virtual Steve McQueen and have him freeze up the growing BLOBs with some liquid oxygen of your own. With the ability to determine the best path for routing data packets, routers are a fundamental component for any enterprisewide network. Network Computing's editors challenged vendors to devise fault-tolerant storage solutions, and you're invited to watch them face off and present their answers.