Method and system for data structure management
AssigneeNVIDIA Corporation
InventorsDmitry Vyshetsky, Paul Gyugyi
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Abstract
Embodiments of the present invention are directed to a method and system for allowing data structures to be moved between storage locations of varying performance and cost without changing the application firmware. In one embodiment, rather than application firmware directly accessing memory, the application firmware requests a data structure by parameters, to which the implementation returns a pointer. The parameters can be, for example, the logical block address of a data sector, and the data structure can be mapping and associated information of that logical block address (LBA) to a location in the flash device.
Claims20
A method for managing data structures in a storage device of a system, said method comprising:
- a) receiving a request in a firmware application for data located in a storage device, said firmware application being executed in said storage device but not directly accessing said storage device;
- b) determining a current configuration of said system;
- c) determining a location of a reference in a memory based on said current memory configuration, said reference comprising a plurality of parameters corresponding to said data;
- and
- d) returning said reference to said firmware application,
- wherein said b), c) and ) are performed by a software application executing in said system.
A method of managing the storage of data structures in a storage device, the method comprising:
- mapping a logical address corresponding to a sector in a flash memory to a physical address of said flash memory, said mapping comprising executing a first function;
- converting said physical address to a data structure comprising a plurality of data elements, said converting comprising executing a second function;
- and
- storing said data structure in a derived location, wherein said derived location is customized for a hardware configuration.
In a system comprising a flash memory device, a plurality of storage components and a hardware device including a processor and a cache, a method of managing data structure requests in a system, said method comprising:
- a) receiving a request, from said hardware device, in a firmware application operating on said flash memory device for a data located at a logical block address in said flash memory device;
- b) mapping said logical block address in said flash memory device to a physical address in said flash memory device;
- c) translating, from said physical address, a data structure corresponding to a data sector in said flash memory device;
- and
- d) returning said data structure corresponding to said data sector to said firmware application, wherein a)-d) are performed without said firmware application accessing said flash memory device directly.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.