High performance transaction storage and retrieval system for commodity computing environments

A transaction storage and retrieval system comprising servers and further comprising:

• input/output processes corresponding respectively to the servers and receiving transaction data from the servers;
• a memory, coupled to the input/output processes, receiving the transaction data from the input/output processes and storing the transaction data;
• disk writers with dedicated threads for corresponding disks;
• and
• subpartition data storage, coupled to the disk writers, said disk writers reading the transaction data from the memory and storing the transaction data in the subpartition storage, said subpartition storage being organized as flat files, each subpartition storage storing data corresponding to a subpartition of the transaction data.

A transaction storage and retrieval system comprising servers and further comprising:

• input/output processes corresponding respectively to data partitions or data subpartitions;
• a memory, coupled to the input/output processes, receiving the transaction data from the input/output processes and storing the transaction data;
• disk writers providing dedicated thread for corresponding disks;
• and
• subpartition data storage, coupled to the disk writers, said disk writers reading the transaction data from the memory and storing the transaction data in the subpartition storage, said subpartition storage being organized as flat files, each subpartition storage storing data corresponding to a subpartition of the transaction data.

An apparatus coupled to servers inputting transaction data, said apparatus comprising:

• groups of transaction storage and retrieval computers, comprising servers, each of the transaction storage and retrieval systems comprising:
• input/output processes corresponding respectively to data partitions and subpartitions
• a memory, coupled to the input/output processes, receiving the transaction data from the input/output processes and storing the transaction data;
• disk writers coupled to the memory and corresponding respectively to the servers;
• and
• subpartition storage, coupled to the disk writers, said disk writers reading the transaction data from the memory and storing the transaction data in the subpartition storage, said subpartition storage being organized as flat files, each subpartition storage storing data corresponding to a subpartition of the transaction data;
• a switch, coupled to the transaction storage and retrieval system, receiving the transaction data from the transaction storage and retrieval system;
• and
• process computers, coupled to the switch, receiving the transaction data from the switch, said process computers processing the transaction data based upon the groups of the transaction storage and retrieval systems.