Managing IT storage infrastructure is an endless balancing act of providing enterprise-class functionality and services while controlling costs. One area that is a considerable component in capital and operational costs is unused storage space that has been allocated to applications but is not being used.

“Thin provisioning” is the practice of allocating storage to applications on a “just-in-time” and “as needed” basis by defining a logical capacity that is larger than the physical capacity. This common practice is a means to reducing or postponing storage costs.