Object storage works by using a client to send and receive files to and from the object store. The files are stored with very little metadata and are treated as a whole entity. The object server does not work in partial pieces of an object the way block storage would work with file blocks. It is a very simple storage method focused on storing and retrieving the contents of the files with minimal overhead to the operating system while interacting with the storage server. The power of the Swift object storage engine is its robust software-defined storage backend. The Swift storage engine has distribution and replication capabilities across its storage nodes. First, let's take a look at the client side of using Swift, and later, we will look at the backend storage engine.