Method and system for responding to file system requests
First Claim
1. A system for responding to file system requests comprising:
- a plurality of network elements which receives the requests;
at least one switching element in communication with the network elements which route the requests; and
a plurality of disk elements in which files are stored and which respond to the requests in communication with the switching element.
3 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A system for responding to file system requests having file IDs comprising V, a volume identifier specifying the file system being accessed, and R, an integer, specifying the file within the file system being accessed. The system includes D disk elements in which files are stored, where D is greater than or equal to 1 and is an integer. The system includes a switching fabric connected to the D disk elements to route requests to a corresponding disk element. The system includes N network elements connected to the switching fabric. Each network element has a mapping function that for every value of V, specifies one or more elements from the set D that store the data specified by volume V, where N is greater than or equal to 1 and is an integer and N+D is greater than or equal to 3, which receives the requests and causes the switching fabric to route the requests by their file ID according to the mapping function. A method for responding to file system requests. The method includes the steps of receiving file system requests having file IDs comprising V, a volume identifier specifying the file system being accessed, and R, an integer, specifying the file within the file system being accessed at network elements. Each network element has a mapping function that for every value of V, specifies one or more elements from the set D that store the data specified by volume V. Then there is the step of routing the requests to a switching fabric connected to the network elements based on the file system request'"'"'s ID according to the mapping function to disk elements connected to the switching fabric.
24 Citations
50 Claims
-
1. A system for responding to file system requests comprising:
-
a plurality of network elements which receives the requests; at least one switching element in communication with the network elements which route the requests; and a plurality of disk elements in which files are stored and which respond to the requests in communication with the switching element.
-
- 2. A system as described in claim 2 including a plurality of switching elements in communication with the network elements and the disk elements which route the requests.
-
27. A method for responding to file system requests comprising the steps of:
-
receiving each request at a network element of a plurality of network elements; routing each request with at least one switching element in communication with the network elements; and responding to each request with at least one disk element of a plurality of disk elements in which files are stored in communication with the switching element. - View Dependent Claims (28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50)
-
Specification