Tiered storage in a distributed file system

A method comprising:

• receiving, at a file server including a tiered file storage system, a request from a client for data stored at a cold tier storage location remote from the file server, wherein the cold tier storage includes data that is selected for offloading;
• in response to the request, sending a notification to the client to cause the client to re-request the requested data from the file server at a later time;
• accessing a cold tier translation table that stores a mapping between an identifier of each of a plurality of virtual cluster descriptors and a storage location of data associated with the respective virtual cluster descriptor;
• querying the cold tier translation table using an identifier of a virtual cluster descriptor associated with the requested data to identify a storage location of the requested data in the cold tier storage;
• and
• loading the requested data to the file server from the identified storage location.

A system comprising:

• a processor;
• at least one machine-readable storage medium comprising instructions executable by the processor to store translation tables that map identifiers of each of a plurality of virtual cluster descriptors to a physical storage location of data corresponding to each virtual cluster descriptor;
• and
• a file server including a tiered file storage system that includes a cold tier storage for data that is selected for offloading, wherein the file server is to:
• store an identifier map;
• in response to a request from a client for data represented by a virtual cluster descriptor of the plurality of virtual cluster descriptors, query the identifier map using an identifier of the virtual cluster descriptor associated with the requested data;
• responsive to the identifier map indicating that the requested data is stored locally at the file server, retrieve the requested data from the file server;
• and
• responsive to the identifier map indicating that the requested data is stored at a location remote from the file server:
• send a notification to the client to cause the client to re-request the requested data from the file server at a later time;
• query the cold tier translator using an identifier of a virtual cluster descriptor associated with requested data to identify a storage location of the requested data in the cold tier storage;
• and
• load the requested data to the file server from the identified storage location.