Managing stored data on a computer network

• US 20060026230A1
• Filed: 09/27/2005
• Published: 02/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 06/06/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Raciborski, Bohdan, Raghavan, Kartik N., Phillips, Thomas G.
• Granted Patent: US 7,676,564 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/00 Network arrangements, protocols or services for addressing or naming
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/45 Network directories; Name-to-address mapping
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1097 for distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A method and system for managing stored data on a computer network organizes data into logical volumes, and each logical volume has a friendly name associated with it. A domain controller keeps track of the friendly names of the logical volumes and associates those friendly names with the actual physical paths of the logical volumes. When a client computer on the network wishes to access a logical volume, it sends a look-up request having the friendly name to the domain controller. The domain controller may fulfill the request by sending the path of the logical volume to the client computer.

Claims

1. A name service for a storage network, the name service comprising:

a storage device linked to the storage network for storing computer-readable data;

a domain controller linked to the network for maintaining an association between the path of a logical volume of data stored on the storage device and a friendly name; and

a client computer linked to the domain controller.

2. The name service of claim 1, wherein the domain controller executes software for performing the steps of:

receiving a request from the client computer for the path of the logical volume, the request including the friendly name;

using the association between the friendly name and the path to determine the path of the logical volume; and

transmitting data regarding the path to the client computer.

3. The name service of claim 1, wherein the domain controller executes software for performing steps comprising:

receiving a request from the client computer for the path of the logical volume;

determining whether or not the client computer is permitted to have access to the logical volume; and

granting or denying the request based on the determining step.

4. The name service of claim 1, wherein the domain controller executes software for performing steps comprising:

reviewing a request from the storage device to register the logical volume;

determining whether or not the storage device is permitted to participate in the storage network; and

granting or denying the request based on the determining step.

5. The name service of claim 1, wherein the logical volume corresponds to a single removable computer-readable medium.

6. The name service of claim 1, wherein the logical volume corresponds to a single disk of the storage device.

7. The name service of claim 1, wherein the logical volume corresponds to a block of data that is striped across multiple disks of the storage device.