I/O MAPPING-PATH TRACKING IN A STORAGE CONFIGURATION

• US 20110145448A1
• Filed: 12/11/2009
• Published: 06/16/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/11/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Gordon, Mark R.
• Granted Patent: US 8,380,894 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 710/38
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1076 Parity data used in redundant arrays of independent storages, e.g. in RAID systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3476 Data logging G06F11/14, G06F11/2205 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0607 by facilitating the process of upgrading existing storage systems, e.g. for improving compatibility between host and storage device
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0653 Monitoring storage devices or systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/067 Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]

Abstract

A system, method and program product for tracking an I/O mapping-path among a plurality of nodes in a storage configuration. A system is disclosed that includes: a path tracking manager implemented at a host system that enables I/O mapping-path tracking for an I/O request being serviced within the storage configuration; and a path tagging system implemented at each of a plurality of virtual storage nodes within the storage configuration, wherein each path tagging system appends mapping-path information to the I/O request in response to receiving and processing the I/O request.

Claims

1. A system for tracking an I/O mapping-path among a plurality of nodes in a storage configuration, comprising:

a path tracking manager implemented at a host system that enables I/O mapping-path tracking for an I/O request being serviced within the storage configuration; and

a path tagging system implemented at each of a plurality of virtual storage nodes within the storage configuration, wherein each path tagging system appends mapping-path information to the I/O request in response to receiving and processing the I/O request.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the path tracking manager captures mapping-path information from an I/O reply obtained from a node in response to servicing of the I/O request.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein each virtual storage node comprises a device selected from a group consisting of:

a RAID, a disk virtualization system, a storage array system, and a hardware controller.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the each virtual storage node includes an I/O manager that maps the I/O request to one or more downstream nodes independently of the host system.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the mapping-path information includes mapping details and a unique identifier of an associated virtual storage node.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the path tracking manager includes a report generator that reports an I/O mapping-path and performance data for an I/O request.

7. The system of claim 6, further comprising a capacity planning system for determining storage requirements for proposed workload changes based on mapping-path tracking results from a plurality of I/O requests.

8. The system of claim 6, wherein the performance data includes a determination of whether the I/O request was fulfilled with cache hit or a cache miss.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein each virtual storage node includes a virtual disk.

10. A method for tracking an I/O mapping-path among a plurality of nodes in a storage configuration, comprising:

enabling I/O mapping-path tracking at a host system for an I/O request being serviced within the storage configuration;

issuing the I/O request to the storage configuration, wherein the storage configuration includes a plurality of virtual storage nodes;

appending mapping-path information to the I/O request at each virtual storage node that processes the I/O request;

servicing the I/O request at a physical disk; and

returning the mapping-path information to the host system.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein each virtual storage node comprises a device selected from a group consisting of:

a RAID, a disk virtualization system, a storage array system, and a hardware controller.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the each virtual storage node that processes the I/O request maps the I/O request to one or more downstream nodes independently of the host system.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the mapping-path information includes mapping details and a unique identifier of an associated virtual storage node.

14. The method of claim 10, further comprising generating a report that includes an I/O mapping-path and performance data for an I/O request.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein each virtual storage node includes a virtual disk.

16. The method of claim 10, wherein each virtual storage node that processes an I/O request determines whether I/O mapping-path tracking is enabled by checking for a flag in a command associated with the I/O request.

17. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

analyzing mapping-path information received from the host system at one of a virtual node or a physical disk; and

altering an operation at one of the virtual node or physical disk based on the mapping-path information.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein an altered operation is selected from a group consisting of:

a caching operation, a priority determination, and a prefetch operation.

19. A computer readable storage medium having a program product stored thereon for tracking an I/O mapping-path among a plurality of nodes in a storage configuration, comprising:

a first program code segment executable by a host system that enables I/O mapping-path tracking for an I/O request being serviced within the storage configuration; and

a second program code segment executable by each of a plurality of virtual storage nodes within the storage configuration, wherein the second program code segment appends mapping-path information to the I/O request in response to receiving and processing the I/O request.

20. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein first program code segment captures mapping-path information from an I/O reply obtained from a node in response to servicing of the I/O request.

21. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein each virtual storage node comprises a device selected from a group consisting of:

a RAID, a disk virtualization system, a storage array system, and a hardware controller.

22. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the mapping-path information includes mapping details and a unique identifier of an associated virtual storage node.

23. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the first program code segment includes a report generator that reports an I/O mapping-path and performance data for an I/O request.

24. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the first program code segment automatically analyzes I/O mapping-path and performance data for an I/O request.

25. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the first program code segment automatically determines storage requirements for proposed workload changes based on mapping-path tracking results from a plurality of I/O requests.

26. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the performance data includes a determination of whether the I/O request was fulfilled with cache hit or a cache miss.

27. A method for deploying a system for tracking an I/O mapping-path among a plurality of nodes in a storage configuration, comprising:

providing a computer infrastructure being operable to;

enable I/O mapping-path tracking from a host system for an I/O request being serviced within the storage configuration; and

append mapping-path information to the I/O request at a virtual storage node within the storage configuration in response to receiving and processing the I/O request.