Drive Resources in Storage Library Behind Virtual Library

• US 20090006733A1
• Filed: 06/27/2007
• Published: 01/01/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company)
• Original Assignee: Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company)
• Inventors: Clark, Shannon Moyes, Gold, Stephen
• Granted Patent: US 9,880,906 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 711/111
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1456 Hardware arrangements for backup
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1461 Backup scheduling policy
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1464 for networked environments
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0611 in relation to response time
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0617 in relation to availability
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/065 Replication mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0686 Libraries, e.g. tape libraries, jukebox

Abstract

Embodiments include methods, apparatus, and systems for managing resources in a physical storage library behind a virtual storage library. In one embodiment, priorities are assigned to copy applications and rules determine which when applications are assigned to resources in the physical storage library.

Claims

1. ) A virtual storage system, comprising:

a virtual storage library having virtual storage devices to emulate physical storage devices of a physical storage library; and

a controller to;

share tape drive resources in the physical storage library with plural different contending copy applications in the virtual storage library without creating separate pools of tape drives reserved for each of the plural different contending copy applications.

2. ) The virtual storage system of claim 1 wherein the controller prioritizes the plural different contending copy applications in a queue in the virtual storage library.

3. ) The virtual storage system of claim 1 wherein the plural different contending copy applications include (1) mirroring virtual storage to physical storage, (2) copying physical tapes in the physical storage library under control of a backup application, and (3) using tape cartridges in the physical storage library to extend storage capacity of the virtual storage library.

4. ) The virtual storage system of claim 1 wherein the physical storage library includes plural tape drives and each of the plural tape drives can be used be each of the plural different contending copy applications.

5. ) The virtual storage system of claim 1 further comprising a policy manager to track which of the plural different contending copy applications is using which of plural tape drive resources in the virtual and physical storage libraries.

6. ) The virtual storage system of claim 1 wherein the controller further prioritizes externally triggered tape copy jobs higher than internal mirror copy jobs.

7. ) The virtual storage system of claim 1 wherein each of the plural different contending copy applications has access to all available tape drives in the physical storage library.

8. ) A computer readable medium having instructions for causing a computer to execute a method, comprising:

assigning different priorities to plural different copy applications in a virtual storage library having virtual storage devices that emulate physical storage devices of a physical storage library;

using user-defined policy rules to determine which of the plural different copy applications in a job queue are assigned to which physical tape drives in the physical storage library.

9. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, assigning a higher priority to externally triggered tape copy jobs and tape scan jobs than internal mirror copy jobs.

10. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, canceling a running lower priority job in a physical tape drive upon receiving a higher priority job so the higher priority job can execute in the physical tape drive.

11. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, limiting how many higher priority externally triggered copy jobs execute at any one time in order to limit how many lower priority copy jobs are canceled by the higher priority externally triggered copy jobs.

12. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, waiting to assign each of the plural different copy applications to a physical tape drive until each of the plural different copy applications start so lower priority jobs execute while higher priority jobs are idle.

13. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, providing all of the plural different copy applications access to all physical tape drives in the physical storage library.

14. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, load balancing copy traffic across tape drive resources in the physical storage library and across plural controllers in the virtual storage library so if one of the plural controllers fails copy jobs are restarted on another of the plural controllers.

15. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, sharing tape drive resources in the physical storage library across multiple contending copy applications inside the virtual storage library without reserving the tape drive resources for the multiple contending copy applications.

16. ) The computer readable medium of claim 8 further comprising, using the user-defined policy rules to determine which of the plural different copy applications are assigned to which of plural tape drives in the physical storage library.

17. ) A method for use with a virtual storage system having virtual storage devices for emulating physical storage devices of an actual storage system, comprising:

assigning different priorities to copy applications in a virtual storage library having virtual storage devices that emulate physical storage devices of a physical storage library;

sharing tape drive resources in the physical storage library with plural contending copy applications inside the virtual storage library without reserving the tape drive resources for the plural contending copy applications.

18. ) The method of claim 17 further comprising, canceling a mirror copy job that is initiating in a physical tape drive in the physical storage library when another copy job with a higher priority is received.

19. ) The method of claim 17 further comprising, assigning a first priority to tape copy jobs, a second priority to tape scan jobs, and a third priority to user-initiated restore jobs that copy data from a physical tape to a virtual tape.

20. ) The method of claim 17 further comprising, only assigning a copy job to a physical tape drive once the copy job commences so lower priority copy jobs execute while higher priority copy jobs are idle.