System and method for storage system

• US 20070136527A1
• Filed: 01/16/2007
• Published: 06/14/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 03/01/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Inventors: Yagisawa, Ikuya, Yagi, Satoshi, Xiaoming, Jiang, Mitsutaka, Daisuke
• Granted Patent: US 7,596,660 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 711/114
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/061 Improving I/O performance
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0613 in relation to throughput
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0631 by allocating resources to storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0658 Controller construction arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0659 Command handling arrangements, e.g. command buffers, queues, command scheduling
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0689 Disk arrays, e.g. RAID, JBOD
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/52 Program synchronisation; Mutual exclusion, e.g. by means of semaphores

Abstract

In a storage system including a plurality of data controllers that receive a data input/output request that is input via an external communication path and perform data input/output processing with respect to a storage resource in response to this request, the plurality of data controllers being connected by a data communication path and being able to communicate with one another, if a data input/output request has been input into one of the controllers, the plurality of data controllers and shares execution of the data input/output processing by communication through the data communication path.

Claims

1. (canceled)

2. A method for load distribution among a plurality of data controllers that receive a data input/output request from an external communication path and perform data input/output processing with respect to a storage resource in response to the data input/output request, the plurality of data controllers being connected by a data communication path and being able to communicate with each another, the method comprising:

a first data controller from among the plurality of data controllers receiving the data input/output request;

the first data controller performing input/output operations with the storage resource on data associated with the data input/output request; and

a second data controller from among the plurality of data controllers performing parity calculations for the data associated with the data input/output request.

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising the first data controller determining whether or not it is designated to perform the parity calculation,

wherein if the first data controller is designated to perform the parity calculation, then the first data controller and the second data controller are the same data controller,

wherein if the first data controller is not designated to perform the parity calculation, then the first data controller is different from the second data controller.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein if the first data controller is not designated to perform the parity calculation, then providing information to the second data controller to perform the parity calculation.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein the second data controller is a predetermined data controller from among the plurality of data controllers other than the first data controller.

6. The method of claim 2, wherein for a subsequent data input/output request, a third data controller performs parity calculations on data associated with the subsequent data input/output request, the third data controller being different from the second data controller.

7. The method of claim 2 wherein the storage resource is configured as a RAID storage group.

8. The method of claim 2 wherein the storage resource is configured as one of a RAID 3 storage group, a RAID 4 storage group, a RAID 5 storage group, or a RAID 6 storage group.

9. A storage system comprising:

a storage resource;

a plurality of disk controllers, each configured to perform I/O operations with the storage resource; and

a control bus providing connection among the disk controllers,

wherein in response to receiving a data input/output request;

a first disk controller from among the disk controllers performs input/output operations with the storage resource on data associated with the data input/output request; and

a second disk controller from among the disk controllers performs parity calculations for the data associated with the data input/output request.

10. The storage system of claim 9 wherein the first data controller determines whether or not it is designated to perform the parity calculation,

wherein if the first data controller is designated to perform the parity calculation, then the first data controller and the second data controller are the same data controller,

wherein if the first data controller is not designated to perform the parity calculation, then the first data controller is different from the second data controller.

11. The storage system of claim 10 wherein if the first data controller is not designated to perform the parity calculation, then the first data controller provides information via the control bus to the second data controller so that the second data controller can perform the parity calculation.

12. The storage system of claim 9 wherein the second data controller is a predetermined data controller from among the data controllers.

13. The storage system of claim 9 wherein for a subsequent data input/output request, a third data controller performs parity calculations on data associated with the subsequent data input/output request, the third data controller being different from the second data controller.

14. The storage system of claim 9 wherein the storage resource is a RAID storage system.

15. The storage system of claim 9 wherein the storage resource is a RAID storage system of one of RAID level 3, or RAID level 4,or RAID level 5, or RAID level 6.