Methods and apparatus for selecting a storage zone for a content unit
AssigneeEMC Corporation
InventorsStephen J. Todd, Tom Teugels, Jan F. Van Riel
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Some embodiments are directed to a technique for storing and/or locating content units stored on an object addressable storage (OAS) system, wherein each content unit is identified by an object identifier. The OAS system may comprise a plurality of zones, each of which stores content units. A mapping process may be defined that maps object identifiers for content units to zones on the OAS system. Thus, the storage location for a content unit on the OAS system may be the zone on the OAS system to which the object identifier for the content unit maps.
Claims15
A method of processing content in a computer system comprising at least one host and at least one storage system that comprises a plurality of zones, each of the zones employing at least one storage resource that is not employed by any other of the plurality of zones, wherein the at least one host accesses content units stored on the at least one storage system using object identifiers, wherein the computer system comprises parsing information that defines how at least a portion of the object identifier for a content unit is to be parsed to determine which of the plurality of zones the content unit is allocated to for storage, the method comprising acts of:
- in response to receipt of a request to store a first content unit, wherein the at least a portion of the object identifier for the first content unit maps to a first zone of the plurality of zones that has an amount of at least one storage resource available that is below at least one threshold, revising the parsing information to split the first zone into at least two zones including the first zone and at least one new zone so that object identifiers that mapped to the first zone before the split map to either the first zone or the at least one new zone after the split;
- transferring content units that map to the at least one new zone, but are stored in the first zone, to the at least one new zone.
At least one computer readable storage device encoded with instructions that, when executed in a computer system comprising at least one host and at least one storage system that comprises a plurality of zones, each of the zones employing at least one storage resource that is not employed by any other of the plurality of zones, perform a method of processing content, wherein the at least one host accesses content units stored on the at least one storage system using object identifiers, wherein the computer system comprises parsing information that defines how at least a portion of the object identifier for a content unit is to be parsed to determine which of the plurality of zones the content unit is allocated to for storage, and wherein the method comprises acts of:
- in response to receipt of a request to store a first content unit, wherein the at least a portion of the object identifier for the first content unit maps to a first zone of the plurality of zones that has an amount of at least one storage resource available that is below at least one threshold, revising the parsing information to split the first zone into at least two zones including the first zone and at least one new zone so that object identifiers that mapped to the first zone before the split map to either the first zone or the at least one new zone after the split;
- transferring content units that map to the at least one new zone, but are stored in the first zone, to the at least one new zone.
At least one storage system comprising:
- a plurality of zones, each of which employs at least one storage resource that is not employed by any other of the plurality of zones;
- a memory for storing parsing information that defines how at least a portion of an object identifier for a content unit is to be parsed to determine which of the plurality of zones the content unit is allocated to for storage;
- and
- at least one controller that:
- in response to receipt of a request to store a first content unit, wherein the at least a portion of the object identifier for the first content unit maps to a first zone of the plurality of zones that has an amount of at least one storage resource available that is below at least one threshold, revises the parsing information to split the first zone into at least two zones including the first zone and at least one new zone so that object identifiers that mapped to the first zone before the split map to either the first zone or the at least one new zone after the split;
- and
- transfers content units that map to the at least one new zone, but are stored in the first zone, to the at least one new zone.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.