Every Hosting Provider is building its own cloud storage solutions. The situation is either build it or lose business to whoever has it, such as Amazon S3, Rackspace Cloud Files or Windows Azure Blob Storage.

Now the question is how to build it fast and take it to market soon. In this sense, OpenStack Object Storage is very attractive. First it is open source. Second, it is based on Rackspace Cloud Files so it has big commercial companies supporting the initiative.

If you are a service provider built on OpenStack storage, you are thinking about how to deliver that storage to user’s desktop. If you are a SMB user, you are thinking about how to use the storage from your desktop too. Either way, you are looking for a Windows client that supports OpenStack storage.

With the release of version 2.4, OpenStack is supported in Gladinet Cloud Desktop, CloudAFS and Cloud Backup, collectively the Gladinet Cloud Storage Access Suite.

[Updated 1/11/2013] With the release of Gladinet Cloud, now there is different access clients surrounding OpenStack swift storage,  including Windows, Mac, Browser based file manager and mobile apps.

Mount It & Use It

In the Gladinet Cloud Storage Access Suite 2.4, you can mount the OpenStack Storage.

You can get the username, password and access point from the service provider who supports OpenStack.

Windows Client

In Gladinet Cloud Desktop, after the OpenStack storage is mounted, you can use it as a network drive with backup functionalities.

In Gladinet CloudAFS, the storage is mounted at the server side. So the windows client is the regular windows SMB client using the OpenStack Storage indirectly through the server, or the cloud gateway.

In Gladinet Cloud Backup, it is another kind of windows client for OpenStack, focused on backup functionalities.

There are 3 ways to deliver OpenStack storage to user’s desktop.

Web Based File Manager

[Updated 1/11/2013] With Gladinet Cloud, you can use web based file manager to access your openstack swift account.

Related Page:

Brandable Access Solutions for OpenStack Swift

gladinet-cloud-access-solutions-for-openstack