| Patent application number | Description | Published |
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| 20100318744 | DIFFERENTIAL CACHING MECHANISM BASED ON MEDIA I/O SPEED - A method for allocating space in a cache based on media I/O speed is disclosed herein. In certain embodiments, such a method may include storing, in a read cache, cache entries associated with faster-responding storage devices and cache entries associated with slower-responding storage devices. The method may further include implementing an eviction policy in the read cache. This eviction policy may include demoting, from the read cache, the cache entries of faster-responding storage devices faster than the cache entries of slower-responding storage devices, all other variables being equal. In certain embodiments, the eviction policy may further include demoting, from the read cache, cache entries having a lower read-hit ratio faster than cache entries having a higher read-hit ratio, all other variables being equal. A corresponding computer program product and apparatus are also disclosed and claimed herein. | 12-16-2010 |
| 20100325356 | NONVOLATILE STORAGE THRESHOLDING - Embodiments for facilitating data transfer between a nonvolatile storage (NVS) write cache and a pool of target storage devices are provided. Each target storage device in the pool of target storage devices is determined as one of a hard disk drive (HDD) and a solid-state drive (SSD) device, and classified into one of a SSD rank group and a HDD rank group. If no data is received in the NVS write cache for a predetermined time to be written to a target storage device classified in the SSD rank group, a threshold of available space in the NVS write cache is set to allocate at least a majority of the available space to the HDD rank group. Upon receipt of a write request for the SSD rank group, the threshold of the available space is reduced to allocate a greater portion of the available space to the SSD rank group. | 12-23-2010 |
| 20110087837 | SECONDARY CACHE FOR WRITE ACCUMULATION AND COALESCING - A method for efficiently using a large secondary cache is disclosed herein. In certain embodiments, such a method may include accumulating, in a secondary cache, a plurality of data tracks. These data tracks may include modified data and/or unmodified data. The method may determine if a subset of the plurality of data tracks makes up a full stride. In the event the subset makes up a full stride, the method may destage the subset from the secondary cache. By destaging full strides, the method reduces the number of disk operations that are required to destage data from the secondary cache. A corresponding computer program product and apparatus are also disclosed and claimed herein. | 04-14-2011 |
| 20110191534 | DYNAMIC MANAGEMENT OF DESTAGE TASKS IN A STORAGE CONTROLLER - Method, system, and computer program product embodiments for facilitating data transfer from a write cache and NVS via a device adapter to a pool of storage devices by a processor or processors are provided. The processor(s) adaptively varies the destage rate based on the current occupancy of the NVS for a particular storage device and stage activity related to that storage device. The stage activity includes one or more of the storage device stage activity, device adapter stage activity, device adapter utilized bandwidth and the read/write speed of the storage device. These factors are generally associated with read response time in the event of a cache miss and not ordinarily associated with dynamic management of the destage rate. This combination maintains the desired overall occupancy of the NVS while improving response time performance. | 08-04-2011 |
| 20110196987 | COMPRESSION ON THIN PROVISIONED VOLUMES USING EXTENT BASED MAPPING - Method, system, and computer program product embodiments for facilitating data compression are provided. A set of logical extents, each having compressed logical tracks of data, is mapped to a head physical extent and, if the head physical extent is determined to have been filled, to at least one overflow extent having spatial proximity to the head physical extent. Pursuant to at least one subsequent write operation and destage operation, the at least one subsequent write operation and destage operation determined to be associated with the head physical extent, the write operation is mapped to one of the head physical extent, the at least one overflow extent, and an additional extent having spatial proximity to the at least one overflow extent. | 08-11-2011 |
| 20110202708 | Integrating A Flash Cache Into Large Storage Systems - An I/O enclosure module is provided with one or more I/O enclosures having a plurality of slots for receiving electronic devices. A host adapter is connected a first slot of the I/O enclosure module and is configured to connect a host to the I/O enclosure. A device adapter is connected to a second slot of the I/O enclosure module and is configured to connect a storage device to the I/O enclosure module. A flash cache is connected to a third slot of the I/O enclosure module and includes a flash-based memory configured to cache data associated with data requests handled through the I/O enclosure module. A primary processor complex manages data requests handled through the I/O enclosure module by communicating with the host adapter, device adapter, and flash cache to manage to the data requests. | 08-18-2011 |
| Patent application number | Description | Published |
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| 20080201523 | PRESERVATION OF CACHE DATA FOLLOWING FAILOVER - In a data storage subsystem with disk storage and a pair of clusters, one set of DASD fast write data is in cache of one cluster and in non-volatile data storage of the other. In response to a failover of one of the pair of clusters to a local cluster, the local cluster converts the DASD fast write data in local cache to converted fast write data to prioritize the converted data for destaging to disk storage. In response to failure to destage, the local cluster allocates local non-volatile storage tracks and emulates a host adapter to store the converted fast write data by the local non-volatile storage, reconverting the converted fast write data of the non-volatile storage to local DASD fast write data stored in the local non-volatile storage and stored in the local cache storage. | 08-21-2008 |
| 20080250210 | COPYING DATA FROM A FIRST CLUSTER TO A SECOND CLUSTER TO REASSIGN STORAGE AREAS FROM THE FIRST CLUSTER TO THE SECOND CLUSTER - Provided are a method, system, and article of manufacture for copying data from a first cluster to a second cluster to reassign storage areas from the first cluster to the second cluster. An operation is initiated to reassign storage areas from a first cluster to a second cluster, wherein the first cluster includes a first cache and a first storage unit and the second cluster includes a second cache and a second storage unit. Data in the first cache for the storage areas to reassign to the second cluster is copied to the second cache. Data in the first storage unit for storage areas remaining assigned to the first cluster is copied to the second storage unit. | 10-09-2008 |
| 20090300298 | MEMORY PRESERVED CACHE TO PREVENT DATA LOSS - A method, system, and computer program product for preserving data in a storage subsystem having dual cache and dual nonvolatile storage (NVS) through a failover from a failed cluster to a surviving cluster is provided. A memory preserved indicator is initiated to mark tracks on a cache of the surviving cluster to be preserved, the tracks having an image in an NVS of the failed cluster. A destage operation is performed to destage the marked tracks. Subsequent to a determination that each of the marked tracks have been destaged, the memory preserved indicator is disabled to remove the mark from the tracks. If the surviving cluster reboots previous to each of the marked tracks having been destaged, the cache is verified as a memory preserved cache, the marked tracks are retained for processing while all unmarked tracks are removed, and the marked tracks are processed. | 12-03-2009 |
| 20090300408 | MEMORY PRESERVED CACHE FAILSAFE REBOOT MECHANISM - A method, system and computer program product for preserving data in a storage subsystem having dual cache and dual nonvolatile storage (NVS) through a failover from a failed cluster to a surviving cluster, the surviving cluster undergoing a rebooting process, is provided. A memory preserved indicator associated with a cache of the surviving cluster is detected. The memory preserved indicator designates marked tracks having an image in an NVS of the failed cluster to be preserved through the rebooting process. A counter in a data structure of the surviving cache is incremented. If a value of the counter exceeds a predetermined value, a cache memory is initialized, and the marked tracks are removed from the cache to prevent an instance of repetitive reboots caused by a corrupted structure in the cache memory. | 12-03-2009 |
| 20100037226 | GROUPING AND DISPATCHING SCANS IN CACHE - A method, system, and computer program product for grouping and dispatching scans in a cache directory of a processing environment is provided. A plurality of scan tasks is aggregated from a scan wait queue into a scan task queue. The plurality of scan tasks is determined by selecting one of (1) each of the plurality of scan tasks on the scan wait queue, (2) a predetermined number of the plurality of scan tasks on the scan wait queue, and (3) a set of scan tasks of a similar type on the scan wait queue. A first scan task from the plurality of scan tasks is selected from the scan task queue. The scan task is performed. | 02-11-2010 |
| 20100191925 | DEFERRED VOLUME METADATA INVALIDATION - A method, system, and computer program product for managing modified metadata in a storage controller cache pursuant to a recovery action by a processor in communication with a memory device is provided. A count of modified metadata tracks for a storage rank is compared against a predetermined criterion. If the predetermined criterion is met, a storage volume having the storage rank is designated with a metadata invalidation flag to defer metadata invalidation of the modified metadata tracks until after the recovery action is performed. | 07-29-2010 |
