Method and apparatus for low latency network performance monitoring

• US 6,434,626 B1
• Filed: 01/14/1999
• Issued: 08/13/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 01/14/1999
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Compaq Computer Corporation (HP Inc.)
• Inventors: Prakash, Ramkrishna V., Whiteman, William F.
• Primary Examiner(s): VU, VIET DUY
• Application Number:
  US09/229,885
• Time in Patent Office: 1,307 Days
• Field of Search: 709/203, 709/220, 709/221, 709/223, 709/224, 709/227, 709/238, 709/313, 709/321, 709/250
• US Class Current: 709/238
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3006 where the computing system is distributed, e.g. networked systems, clusters, multiprocessor systems multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46; allocation of resources G06F9/50
• 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 11/3055 Monitoring arrangements for monitoring the status of the computing system or of the computing system component, e.g. monitoring if the computing system is on, off, available, not available error or fault processing without redundancy G06F11/0703; error detection or correction by redundancy in data representation G06F11/08; error detection or correction by redundancy in operation G06F11/14; error detection or correction by redundancy in hardware G06F11/16
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5012 determining service availability, e.g. which services are available at a certain point in time
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/00 Arrangements for monitoring or testing data switching networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/065 related to network devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0811 by checking connectivity
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0817 by checking functioning
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0888 Throughput
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/10 Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route

Abstract

A method and apparatus for reducing latency caused by cumulative point-to-point messaging associated with network performance monitoring in SAN-attached I₂O architectures. In a computer system, a performance monitoring OSM associated with a first node generates status request messages to a first multicast ISM residing on a first governor IOP associated with a first node for requesting the status from all nodes. The first multicast ISM generates status request messages to all node 1 devices and node 1 IOPs and to a second multicast ISM residing on a node 2 governor IOP. The second multicast ISM generates status request messages to all node 2 devices and node 2 IOPs. One or more “unhealthy” device response messages may be sent to the performance monitoring OSM containing the TID of the “unhealthy” device to allow a subsequent point-to-point detailed status request message to be issued. For “healthy” nodes, a response message is issued to an adjacent governor IOP with an “all fine” indication and the TID set to the TID of the governor IOP. If all nodes in the network are “healthy”, an “all fine” indication is passed to the performance monitoring OSM with the TID set to the TID of the governor IOP of the performance monitoring node.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a first message passing intermediary in a network, the first message passing intermediary forming at least a part of a first network node, the first message passing intermediary configured to;

receive a status request message from a performance monitoring server; and

propagate the status request message across the network to minimize concurrently issued point-to-point status requests messages.

2. The system as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

a second network node connected to the first network node by an interconnect fabric;

wherein the first network node includes a first plurality of devices and the second network node includes a second plurality of devices and a second message passing intermediary.

3. The system as recited in claim 2, wherein the first message passing intermediary is further configured to propagate the status request message to the first plurality of devices and to the second message passing intermediary.

4. The system as recited in claim 3, wherein the second message passing intermediary is further configured to:

receive a status request message propagated from the first message passing intermediary; and

propagate the status request message to the second plurality of devices.

5. The system as recited in claim 4, wherein the second message passing intermediary is further configured to propagate the status request message to a third network node.

6. The system as recited in claim 2, further comprising:

an Operating System Module (OSM) residing on the performance monitoring server, the OSM configured to generate the status request message and issue the status message to at least one of the first and second message passing intermediaries,

wherein the first message passing intermediary resides on a first IOP and the second message passing intermediary resides on a second IOP.

7. The system as recited in claim 2, wherein the first message passing intermediary is a first multicast Intermediate Service Module (ISM), and the second message passing intermediary is a second multicast ISM, the first multicast ISM further configured to propagate the status request message across the network in a multicast mode, the second multicast ISM further configured to receive the status request message from the first multicast ISM and to propagate the status request message across the network fabric in a multicast mode.

8. The system, as recited in claim 4, wherein each of the first and second plurality of devices includes at least one IOP, and further wherein one of the at least one IOP is designated as a governor IOP such that the first message passing intermediary resides in the first governor IOP and in second message passing intermediary resides in the second governor IOP.

9. The system as recited in claim 8, wherein the each governor IOP is further configured to receive a plurality of responses from each of the respective first and second plurality of devices and to generate a response indicating the health of the respective first and second plurality of devices.

10. The system as recited in claim 8, wherein the first governor IOP is further configured to:

receive a status response message from the first plurality of devices; and

receive a status response message from the second governor IOP indicating the status of the second plurality of devices.

11. The system as recited in claim 10, wherein the status response is a two-mode status response including a “

healthy”

mode and an “

unhealthy”

mode, and wherein the first governor IOP is further configured to report the Target ID (TID) of the governor IOP associated with the first node for the status response in the healthy mode and to report the TID of an unhealthy device for the status response in the unhealthy mode to the performance monitoring server.

12. The system as recited in claim 11, wherein the performance monitoring server, upon receipt of the “

unhealthy”

mode status response, is configured to issue a point-to-point detailed status request to the “

unhealthy”

device.

13. A system, comprising:

a first message passing intermediary structure forming at least part of a first network node disposed in a network; and

a second message passing intermediary structure forming at least a part of a second network node disposed in the network, wherein each of the first and second message passing intermediary structures is configured to;

receive a status request message from a performance monitoring apparatus; and

process the status request message and in response thereto propagate the status request message across the network to the other message passing intermediary structure.

14. A method for monitoring performance in a network comprising the steps of:

sending a status request message to a governor I/O processor (IOP) disposed at a first node; and

propagating the status request message across the network to minimize concurrently issued point-to-point status requests messages.

15. The method as recited in claim 14, further comprising the steps of:

interconnecting the first node with a second node using a network interconnect fabric;

wherein the first node includes a first message passing intermediary and a first plurality of devices and the second node includes a second plurality of devices and a second message passing intermediary.

16. The method as recited in claim 15, further comprising the step of propagating the status request message from the first message passing intermediary to the first plurality of devices and to the second message passing intermediary.

17. The method as recited in claim 15, further comprising the steps of:

receiving a status request message at the second message passing intermediary propagated from the first message passing intermediary; and

propagating the status request message to the second plurality of devices.

18. The method as recited in claim 17, further comprising the step of propagating the status request message from the second message passing intermediary to a third adjacent network node.