Once you have installed and configured your Ceph storage cluster, the next task is performing storage provisioning. Storage provisioning is the process of assigning storage space or capacity to physical or virtual servers, either in the form of block, file, or object storage. A typical computer system or server comes with a limited local storage capacity that might not be enough for your data storage needs. Storage solutions such as Ceph provide virtually unlimited storage capacity to these servers, making them capable of storing all your data and making sure that you do not run out of space. Using a dedicated storage system instead of local storage gives you the much-needed flexibility in terms of scalability, reliability, and performance.

Ceph can provision storage capacity in a unified way, which includes block, filesystem, and object storage. The following diagram shows storage formats supported by Ceph, and depending on your use case, you can select one or more storage options:

We will discuss each of these options in detail through this book, but in this chapter, we will focus on Ceph block storage.