Cloudflare simplifies data migration, caching, log management with R2

Cloudflare R2 is an S3-compatible, globally distributed object storage solution that enables developers to store large amounts of unstructured data without incurring the high egress bandwidth fees that are common with other providers. Several new R2-related features were announced by the company during Developer Week:

R2 Super Slurper

Allows developers to cheaply and easily move data over from S3, by one giant slurp, or sip by sip – all in a friendly, intuitive UI and API.

• A giant slurp will allow developers to target an S3 bucket and import the objects stored there into an R2 bucket for a simple, one-time import that covers the most common scenarios.

• A sip by sip migration provides a way to incrementally copy objects to R2 as they get requested from an end-user. In essence, it’s a multi-cloud architecture that allows customers to start serving objects from R2 as they migrate, saving money immediately.

Cloudflare Logs Engine

A new product to enable any kind of investigation with Cloudflare Logs — all within Cloudflare. Logs Engine enables customers to store their logs on Cloudflare R2 in a cost-effective, easy to use way for all customers.

• Previously, Cloudflare customers would have to use a third-party tool or partner to work with their logs, but these solutions were expensive and technically complex.

• Cloudflare’s entry to logs management is possible thanks to being built directly on R2. It is also closely integrated with Cloudflare’s analytics systems, helping to simplify and keep costs low when exploring data and narrowing queries.

Starting today, Cloudflare customers who push their logs to R2 can retrieve them by time range and unique identifier. Over the coming months Cloudflare aims to enable customers to:

• Store logs for any Cloudflare dataset, for as long as they want, with a few clicks

• Access logs no matter what plan customers use, without relying on third party tools

• Write queries that include multiple datasets

• Quickly identify the logs needed and take action based on the findings

Cache Reserve

It was announced earlier this year and is now in open beta to assist users in serving content from Cloudflare’s cache for longer periods of time by utilizing R2’s persistent data storage. Serving content from Cloudflare’s cache benefits website operators by lowering their bills for egress fees from origins, while website visitors benefit from faster loading content.

In addition to the work done by the company to scale Cache Reserve, opening up the product allows for more features and integrations across Cloudflare. It intends to provide Cache Reserve users with additional analytics and metrics so they can understand exactly what’s in Cache Reserve and how much egress it saves them. It also intends to build out more complex integrations with R2 so that customers can easily transition from managing their storage to managing their storage. Finally, the company will investigate ways to give customers more control over what is eligible for Cache Reserve. These features are just the beginning of how Cloudflare customers will control and customize their cache.

“R2 gives organizations the freedom to create the multi-cloud architectures they desire with an S3-compatible object storage. These new features introduced will continue to reduce egress fees associated with moving and querying data, and democratize log management in the most cost-effective, simplest way,” says Bashar Bashaireh, Managing Director of Middle East & Turkey at Cloudflare.