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US 2006/0224844 A1Published application
Data copying method and apparatus in a thin provisioned system
AssigneeHitachi, Ltd.
InventorsYoshiki Kano, Akira Yamamoto
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Data migration includes copying between normal volumes and thin provisioned volumes. Data in a normal volume can be copied to a thin provisioned volume. Alternatively, data structures can be provided to facilitate converting a normal volume into a thin provisioned volume without actual copying of data. Copying from a thin provisioned volume to a normal volume is also disclosed.
Claims28
A data migration method in a storage system comprising:
- receiving a designation of a source volume, the source volume comprising data for which the data migration will be performed;
- receiving a designation of a target volume, the target volume comprising one or more storage segments allocated from a disk device;
- and
- for each logical block address in the source volume, if the logical block address designates an area on the source volume that contains production data, then copying the production data to the target volume,
- the copying comprising:
- allocating a free storage segment from the disk device to the target volume if the logical block address does not designate a storage segment that has been allocated to the target volume;
- and
- associating the logical block address with the allocated free storage segment, the logical block address thereby designating the allocated free storage segment,
- wherein the allocating and the associating are performed automatically without user involvement.
6 more elements
A data migration method in a storage system comprising:
- receiving a designation of a source volume, the source volume comprising a plurality of data blocks, each data block having an associated logical block address, some of the data blocks storing data on which the data migration will be performed;
- receiving a designation of a target volume;
- defining a plurality of segments on the source volume, each segment comprising one or more of the data blocks;
- if a segment includes a data block that contains data, then associating the segment with the logical block address of one of its associated data blocks and associating the segment with the target volume, whereby the target volume comprises one or more of the segments, each segment being associated with a logical block address and comprising data;
- and
- if a segment does not include a data block that contains data, then associating the segment with a list of free segments.
3 more elements
A method for a storage system comprising:
- receiving from a host system a write request directed to a first volume;
- allocating a storage segment from a physical storage device, if the storage segment designated by the logical block address associated with the write request does not exist on the first volume, wherein the determining and the allocating are performed automatically without user involvement;
- associating the logical block address with the allocated storage segment, wherein data associated with the write request is written to the allocated storage segment;
- receiving from the host system a designation of a target volume, the target volume being the destination of a migration operation of data stored in the first volume;
- and
- for each storage segment in the first volume, copying data from the storage segment to a location on the target device that is identified by the logical block address associated with the storage segment.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.