Quasi Disk Drive for Testing Disk Interface Performance

• US 20120331344A1
• Filed: 06/24/2011
• Published: 12/27/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 06/24/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Pratt, Steven L., Dobbelstein, Steven L.
• Granted Patent: US 9,244,807 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 714/28
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2221 to test input/output devices or peripheral units
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/261 by simulating additional hardware, e.g. fault simulation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3419 by assessing time
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3485 for I/O devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0604 Improving or facilitating administration, e.g. storage management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0653 Monitoring storage devices or systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0664 at device level, e.g. emulation of a storage device or system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0674 Disk device

Abstract

Embodiments of the invention relate to diagnostic evaluation of hardware components of a computer machine. A conventional storage device is replaced with a modified storage device. Read and write operations are received by the modified storage device. Issuance of a response to the read and write operations is limited to an acknowledgement receipt, which is employed to evaluate performance and/or bandwidth of the machines with respect to hardware for data storage.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

configuring a hardware element in communication with an operating system, the hardware element having;

logic to emulate behavior of an actual persistent storage device, and a connector to support a direct connection of the hardware element into a storage slot;

sending a request from an application to the hardware element, the request to access the hardware element, including the hardware element to respond to the request without processing data to support the request;

testing performance of supporting hardware in communication with the hardware element, including measuring a factor associated with sending of the request to receipt of the response.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the request includes an operation selected from the group consisting of:

a read operation and a write operation.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the application is a diagnostic application to support measurement of the duration.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising evaluating speed of processing the request, including evaluating speed of an intermediate component that supports physical communication of the request to the hardware element.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising sending two or more requests in parallel to the hardware element and the measured factor testing capacity of an intermediate component that supports physical communication of the request to the hardware element.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising sending at least two requests in parallel to at least two of the hardware elements and measuring a factor associated with sending of the requests to receipt of the responses.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the factor is a measurement of bandwidth of a channel supporting the at least two requests in parallel.

8. A system comprising:

a processing unit in communication with memory and an operating system;

a hardware element in communication with an operating system, the hardware element having;

logic to emulate behavior of an actual persistent storage device, and a connector to plug directly into a storage slot;

a functional unit in communication with the memory, the functional unit comprising;

a diagnostic program to support issuance of an evaluation to the hardware element;

a request manager in communication with the diagnostic program, the request manager to send a request from the diagnostic program to the hardware element, the request manager to access the hardware element, including receipt of a response communication from the hardware element to the request without processing data to support the request; and

a test manager in communication with the request manager, the test manager to test performance of supporting hardware in communication with the hardware element, including measurement of a factor associated with both the send request by the request manager and receipt of the response.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the program is a diagnostic application to support measurement of the duration.

10. The system of claim 9, further comprising an evaluation manager in communication with the test manager, the evaluation manager to evaluate speed of processing the request, including evaluation of speed of an intermediate component that supports physical communication of the request to the hardware element.

11. The system of claim 8, further comprising the request manager to send two or more requests in parallel to the hardware element and the measured factor to test capacity of an intermediate component that supports physical communication of the request to the hardware element.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the request includes an operation selected from the group consisting of:

a read operation and a write operation.

13. The system of claim 12, further comprising the request manager to send at least two requests in parallel to at least two of the hardware elements and to measure a factor associated with sending of the requests to receipt of the response.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the factor is a measurement of bandwidth of a channel supporting the at least two requests in parallel.

15. A computer program product for use with an electronic communication, the computer program product comprising a computer-readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied thereon, which when executed causes a computer to implement a method for testing performance of computer hardware, the method comprising:

configuring a hardware element in communication with an operating system, the hardware element having;

logic to emulate behavior of an actual persistent storage device, and a connector to plug directly into a hard drive slot;

sending a request from an application to the hardware element, the request to access the hardware element, including the hardware element to respond to the request without processing data to support the request; and

testing performance of supporting hardware in communication with the hardware element, including measuring a factor associated with sending of the request to receipt of the response.

16. The computer program product of claim 15, further comprising evaluating speed of processing the request, including evaluating speed of intermediate components that support physical communication of the request to the hardware element.

17. The computer program product of claim 15, further comprising sending two or more requests in parallel to the hardware element and the measured factor testing capacity of intermediate components that support physical communication of the request with the hardware element.

18. The computer program product of claim 17, further comprising sending at least two requests in parallel to at least two of the hardware elements and measuring a factor associated with sending of the requests to receipt of the response.

19. A computer implemented method for evaluation of hardware components, the method comprising:

a hardware element in communication with an operating system, the hardware element configured with a connector and directly connected into a hard drive slot and embedded logic for emulating behavior of an actual persistent storage device, and;

an application sending a request to the hardware element, the request accessing the embedded logic;

a diagnostic tool receiving response communication from the embedded logic, wherein the response communication includes data acknowledging receipt of the request without processing data to support the request; and

testing performance of supporting hardware in communication with the hardware element, including measuring a factor associated with sending of the request and receipt of the response communication.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the step of testing performance includes evaluating response data to determine duration for processing the request and capacity of associated hardware to support the request.