SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR ADAPTIVE ERROR-CORRECTION CODING

• US 20160371144A1
• Filed: 08/31/2016
• Published: 12/22/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 12/06/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Unification Technologies LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Longitude Enterprise Flash S.à r.l. (Vector Capital Corporation)
• Inventors: Fillingim, Jeremy, Flynn, David, Strasser, John, Inskeep, Bill
• Granted Patent: US 11,061,765 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/10 Adding special bits or symbols to the coded information, e.g. parity check, casting out 9's or 11's
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1044 with specific ECC/EDC distribution
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1068 in sector programmable memories, e.g. flash disk G06F11/1072 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/108 Parity data distribution in semiconductor storages, e.g. in SSD
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0253 Garbage collection, i.e. reclamation of unreferenced memory
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2211/109 Sector level checksum or ECC, i.e. sector or stripe level checksum or ECC in addition to the RAID parity calculation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/2022 Flash memory
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0619 in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/064 Management of blocks
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0679 Non-volatile semiconductor memory device, e.g. flash memory, one time programmable memory [OTP]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/52 Program synchronisation; Mutual exclusion, e.g. by means of semaphores
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/52 Protection of memory contents; Detection of errors in memory contents
• CPC Class Codes: H03M 13/35 Unequal or adaptive error protection, e.g. by providing a different level of protection according to significance of source information or by adapting the coding according to the change of transmission channel characteristics
• CPC Class Codes: H03M 13/353 Adaptation to the channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/46 Interconnection of networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/4625 Single bridge functionality, e.g. connection of two networks over a single bridge
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/6418 Hybrid transport
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1097 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]

Abstract

A storage module is configured to store data segments, such as error-correcting code (ECC) codewords, within an array comprising a plurality of columns. The ECC codewords may comprise ECC codeword symbols. The ECC symbols of a data segment may be arranged in a horizontal arrangement, a vertical arrangement, a hybrid channel arrangement, and/or vertical stripe arrangement within the array. The individual ECC symbols may be stored within respective columns of the array (e.g., may not cross column boundaries). Data of an unavailable ECC symbol may be reconstructed by use of other ECC symbols stored on other columns of the array.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

arranging a plurality of error-correcting code (“

ECC”

) codeword symbols for storage within different independent channels, wherein each channel of the different independent channels comprises two or more solid-state storage elements; and

storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols in the different independent channels.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein a storage module stores the plurality of ECC codeword symbols in the different independent channels.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the storage module comprises a controller and firmware.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the storage module comprises a groomer module, and the groomer module performs grooming operations comprising reclaiming storage resources.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols comprises storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols in a horizontal arrangement.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols comprises storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols in a vertical stripe configuration.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols comprises storing the plurality of ECC codeword symbols in separate columns to access the ECC codeword symbols in parallel.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of ECC codeword symbols correspond to N bytes of data.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the plurality of ECC codeword symbols comprises a number of bytes greater than N.

10. A method comprising:

identifying two or more independent channel channels comprising a set of error-correcting code (“

ECC”

) codeword symbols corresponding to requested data, wherein each independent channel of the two or more independent channels comprises two or more solid-state storage elements; and

extracting the set of ECC codeword symbols from the identified two or more independent channels.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the set of ECC codeword symbols is stored in a horizontal arrangement.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the set of ECC codeword symbols is stored in a vertical stripe configuration.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the set of ECC codeword symbols is stored in separate columns to access the set of ECC codeword symbols in parallel.

14. A method comprising:

reading two or more error-correcting code (“

ECC”

) codeword symbols, each of the two or more ECC codeword symbols being read from a respective independent channel;

correcting errors in the one or more ECC codeword symbols; and

reconstructing a failed element using at least one of the corrected ECC codeword symbols and parity data.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein reconstructing the failed element comprises reconstructing the failed element using the corrected ECC codeword symbols and parity data.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the one or more ECC codeword symbols are stored in a horizontal arrangement.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein the one or more ECC codeword symbols are stored in a vertical stripe configuration.

18-23. -23. (canceled)