STORAGE SYSTEM

• US 20160070492A1
• Filed: 08/18/2015
• Published: 03/10/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 08/28/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Cherubini, Giovanni, Iliadis, Ilias, Jelitto, Jens, Venkatesan, Vinodh
• Granted Patent: US 10,579,281 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/008 Reliability or availability analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2094 Redundant storage or storage space G06F11/2056 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3034 where the computing system component is a storage system, e.g. DASD based or network based digital input from or digital output to record carriers G06F3/06; digital recording or reproducing G11B20/18; for distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS], H04L67/1097
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3442 for planning or managing the needed capacity
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3485 for I/O devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/00 Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/86 Event-based monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0619 in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0643 Management of files
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0653 Monitoring storage devices or systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0665 at area level, e.g. provisioning of virtual or logical volumes
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/068 Hybrid storage device
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0685 Hybrid storage combining heterogeneous device types, e.g. hierarchical storage, hybrid arrays
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A method for storing a data segment in a storage tier of a storage unit comprising at least two storage tiers includes receiving the data segment to be stored including metadata; receiving metadata of data segments stored in the storage unit; and determining the storage tier to store the received data segment to and a protection level dependent on the metadata received and dependent on the metadata of the received data segment.

Claims

1. (canceled)

2. (canceled)

3. (canceled)

4. (canceled)

5. (canceled)

6. (canceled)

7. (canceled)

8. (canceled)

9. (canceled)

10. (canceled)

11. (canceled)

12. (canceled)

13. A device, comprising:

a processing unit configured to determine a storage tier of a storage unit having at least two storage tiers and a protection level for a data segment received for storage, by;

receiving the data segment to be stored including metadata;

receiving metadata of data segments stored in the storage unit; and

determining the storage tier to store the received data segment to and a protection level dependent on the metadata received and dependent on the metadata of the received data segment.

14. A storage system, comprising:

a storage unit comprising at least two storage tiers;

a processing unit according to claim 13; and

logic configured to store the received data segment to the determined storage tier and at the determined protection level.

15. A nontransitory computer readable storage medium having computer readable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by a computer, implement a method for storing a data segment in a storage tier of a storage unit comprising at least two storage tiers, the method comprising:

receiving the data segment to be stored including metadata;

receiving metadata of data segments stored in the storage unit; and

determining the storage tier to store the received data segment to and a protection level dependent on the metadata received and dependent on the metadata of the received data segment.

16. The storage medium of claim 15, wherein determining the storage tier and the protection level includes identifying a storage tier and a protection level at which a majority of data segments showing the same or similar metadata as the received data segment is stored.

17. The storage medium of claim 15, wherein:

a relevance class out of a set of at least two relevance classes is assigned to the received data segment; and

the storage tier is determined for the received data segment dependent on the relevance class assigned to the received data segment.

18. The storage medium of claim 17, wherein the method further comprises:

determining information about a frequency at which data segments stored in one or more of the at least two storage tiers are accessed;

determining the storage tier for storing the received data segment to be dependent on at least access frequency information received for data segments in the same relevance class;

determining a level of protection for the classified data segment dependent on at least the relevance class assigned; and

storing the classified data segment including the assigned relevance class to the determined storage tier and according to the determined level of protection.

19. The storage medium of claim 15, wherein:

the metadata of a data segment comprises a set of variables; and

the set of variables includes one or more of;

a user of the data segment, a size of the data segment, an access control list for the data segment, a time of generation of the data segment, a time of last modification of the data segment, a time of last access of the data segment, a location of the data segment in a directory structure, a group to which a user of the data segment belongs, a name of the data segment, an indication of whether structured or unstructured data are contained in the data segment, and an indication of a required data retention time.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein:

an observable is determined containing one or more variables of the set;

for each value of the observable a distribution of stored data segments across the relevance classes of the set is determined; and

the relevance class is assigned to the received data segment dependent on the distribution determined for a value of the observable that is identified for the received data segment.