STORAGE MANAGEMENT METHOD AND STORAGE SYSTEM IN VIRTUAL VOLUME HAVING DATA ARRANGED ASTRIDE STORAGE DEVICE

• US 20140351545A1
• Filed: 02/10/2012
• Published: 11/27/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 02/10/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Inventors: Nakajima, Akio
• Granted Patent: US 9,229,645 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 711/170
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0604 Improving or facilitating administration, e.g. storage management
• 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 3/0617 in relation to availability
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0629 Configuration or reconfiguration of storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0638 Organizing or formatting or addressing of data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0641 De-duplication techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0664 at device level, e.g. emulation of a storage device or system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0665 at area level, e.g. provisioning of virtual or logical volumes
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/067 Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0689 Disk arrays, e.g. RAID, JBOD

Abstract

An administrator instructs creation of a volume to a virtual storage device and registration of a host port for providing access permission to the volume. The virtual storage device searches a candidate of a physical storage device capable of reaching the host port and a candidate of the target port based on the access permission information, and creates a distributed volume astride the candidate physical storage device. The distributed volume is composed of a plurality of partial volumes, and the partial volumes inherit the functions of the storage device and the access permission information set for the distributed volume. The virtual storage device distributes an access permission to the physical storage device, constitutes the access permission information of the host port and the volume with respect to the candidate target port, and registers the access permission information of the host port and the target port to the SAN switch.

Claims

1. A storage system comprising a host, a first storage device providing a volume to the host, and a second storage device, which are mutually coupled via a network, wherein

the first storage device and the second storage device each stores a volume information for managing the volume and an access information for managing the access among said mutually coupled storage devices;

and

each receives a new access information from the host;

wherein the first storage device

creates a first partial volume constituting a part of the distributed virtual volume in the first storage device by referring to the volume information and the new access information;

creates a second partial volume constituting a part of the distributed virtual volume in the second storage device;

establishes a coupling between the host and the first storage device; and

wherein the second storage device establishes a coupling between the host and the second storage device; and

wherein the host issues an IO to the distributed virtual volume by referring to the new access information.

2. The storage system according to claim 1, wherein

if the network is a SAN:

the establishment of the coupling between the first storage device and the second storage device is performed by setting a zoning.

3. The storage system according to claim 2, wherein

the first storage device further determines a number of the partial volumes constituting the distributed virtual volume based on a required performance of the distributed virtual volume and the performances of the first storage device and the second storage device.

4. The storage system according to claim 3, wherein

the volume information includes information related to a type of the volume;

and

the second storage device further synchronizes the first storage device and the volume information.

5. The storage system according to claim 4, wherein

the first storage device further stores a program information related to a function of the first storage device, and sends the program information to the second storage device.

6. The storage system according to claim 4, wherein

the first storage device and the second storage device stores an identical hash information;

executes de-duplication by referring to the hash information;

receives a read request from the host;

specifies the storage device storing a target data of the read request by referring to the hash information; and

if the storage device having received the read request is not the specified storage device, reads the target data of the read request from the specified storage device and sends the same to the host.

7. The storage system according to claim 4, wherein

the first storage device and the second storage device stores an identical hash information;

executes de-duplication by referring to the hash information;

receives a read request from the host;

specifies the storage device storing a target data of the read request by referring to the hash information; and

if the storage device having received the read request is not the specified storage device, sends a request to the host to reissue the read request to the specified storage device.

8. The storage system according to claim 4, further comprising a third storage device and a fourth storage device, wherein

the first storage device has a journal volume having a differential information of the first partial volume;

the third storage device and the fourth storage device respectively has a third partial volume or a fourth partial volume constituting a part of the journal volume; and

the first storage device sends an IO request received from the host to the journal volume to the third storage device or the fourth storage device by referring to the access information.

9. The storage system according to claim 4, wherein

the access information is a Referral information.

10. A storage management method of a storage system comprising a host, a first storage device providing a volume to the host, and a second storage device, which are mutually coupled via a network, wherein

the first storage device and the second storage device each stores a volume information for managing the volume and an access information for managing the access among said mutually coupled storage devices;

wherein the storage management method comprises the steps of;

sending a new access information from the host to the first storage device;

creating a first partial volume constituting a part of the distributed virtual volume in the first storage device by referring to the volume information and the new access information;

creating a second partial volume constituting a part of the distributed virtual volume in the second storage device;

establishing a coupling between the host and the first storage device;

establishing a coupling between the host and the second storage device; and

issuing an IO request from the host computer to the distributed virtual volume by referring to the new access information.

11. The storage management method according to claim 10, wherein

if the network is a SAN:

the establishment of the coupling between the first storage device and the second storage device is performed by setting a zoning.

12. The storage management method according to claim 11, wherein

the first storage device further determines a number of the partial volumes constituting the distributed virtual volume based on a required performance of the distributed virtual volume and the performances of the first storage device and the second storage device.

13. The storage management method according to claim 11, wherein

the first storage device and the second storage device stores an identical hash information;

wherein the method comprises the steps of;

executing de-duplication by referring to the hash information;

specifying the storage device storing a target data of the read request sent from the host by referring to the hash information; and

if the storage device having received the read request is not the specified storage device, reading the target data of the read request from the specified storage device and sending the same to the host.

14. The storage management method according to claim 11, wherein

the first storage device and the second storage device store an identical hash information;

wherein the method comprises the steps of;

executing de-duplication by referring to the hash information;

specifying the storage device storing a target data of the read request sent from the host by referring to the hash information; and

if the storage device having received the read request is not the specified storage device, sending a request to the host to reissue the read request to the specified storage device.

15. The storage management method according to claim 11, wherein the storage device further comprises a third storage device and a fourth storage device,

the first storage device has a journal volume having a differential information of the first partial volume;

the third storage device has a third partial volume constituting a part of the journal volume;

the fourth storage device has a fourth partial volume constituting a part of the journal volume; and

the method comprises a step of sending to the third storage device or the fourth storage device an IO request from the host to the journal volume by referring to the access information.