US 10,067,682 B1 · I/O accelerator for striped disk arrays using parity

Abstract

Disclosed herein is an enhanced volume manager (VM) for a storage system that accelerates input/output (I/O) performance for random write operations to a striped disk array using parity. More specifically, various implementations are directed to accelerating “random writes” (writes comprising less than a complete stripe of data) by consolidating several random writes together to create a “sequential write” (a full-stripe write) to eliminate one or more read operations and/or increase the volume of new/updated data stored for each write operation. Several such implementations comprise functionality in the VM (volume manager) for identifying random write I/O requests, queuing them locally in a journal, and then periodically flushing the journal to the disk array as a sequential write request.

Claims20

Dependent claims

A non-transitory computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon for accelerating I/O performance for a striped-disk array that, when executed by a storage computer, cause the storage computer to:

receive a write I/O request directed to a portion of a stripe of the striped-disk array;
determine, prior to any forwarding of the received write I/O request to the striped-disk array, whether the write I/O request is random or sequential by comparing the write I/O request to a plurality of recent I/O requests;
in response to determining that the write I/O request is random, record the random write I/O request in a journal data storage area of the striped-disk array;
and
periodically flush the journal data storage area by forming a sequential write I/O that spans a width of a stripe of the striped-disk array, the formed sequential write I/O comprising the random write I/O request and at least one other random write I/O request that is recorded in the journal data storage area.

2 more elements

A storage computer for accelerating I/O performance for a striped-disk array, comprising:

a processing unit;
and
a memory communicatively connected to the processing unit that stores computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the processing unit, cause the storage computer to:
receive a write I/O request directed to a portion of a stripe of the striped-disk array;
determine, prior to any forwarding of the received write I/O request to the striped-disk array, whether the write I/O request is random or sequential by comparing the write I/O request to a plurality of recent I/O requests;
in response to determining that the write I/O request is random, record the random write I/O request in a journal data storage area of the striped-disk array;
and
periodically flush the journal data storage area by forming a sequential write I/O that spans a width of a stripe of the striped-disk array, the formed sequential write I/O comprising the random write I/O request and at least one other random write I/O request that is recorded in the journal data storage area.

5 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

I/O accelerator for striped disk arrays using parity

Life of this patent

I/O accelerator for striped disk arrays using parity

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims20