Storage switch for storage area network

• US 7,707,304 B1
• Filed: 01/18/2002
• Issued: 04/27/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/28/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Emc IP Holding Company LLC (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Original Assignee: EMC Corporation (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Inventors: Asthana, Sunil K., Tan, Enyew, Hegde, Anoop R., Lolayekar, Santosh C., Frey, Robert T., Lee, Wan-Hui, Maranon, Renato E., Cheng, Yu-Ping
• Primary Examiner(s): Refai; Ramsey
• Application Number:
  US10/051,321
• Time in Patent Office: 3,021 Days
• Field of Search: 370/395.5, 370/400, 370/229, 370/235, 370/236.1, 370/351, 370/353, 370/360, 370/364, 370/389, 709/226, 709/201, 709/217, 709/223, 709/225, 709/235, 709/232, 709/233
• US Class Current: 709/233
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/263 Rate modification at the source after receiving feedback
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/3072 Packet splitting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/352 Gigabit ethernet switching [GBPS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/357 Fibre channel switches
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/45 Arrangements for providing or supporting expansion
• 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]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/16 Implementation or adaptation of Internet protocol [IP], of transmission control protocol [TCP] or of user datagram protocol [UDP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/169 Special adaptations of TCP, UDP or IP for interworking of IP based networks with other networks protocols for interworking, protocol conversion H04L69/08

Abstract

A storage switch in accordance with an embodiment of the invention is a highly scalable switch that allows the creation of a SAN that is easy to deploy and that can be centrally managed. Moreover, such a storage switch also allows the deployment of a global infrastructure, allowing the resources of the SAN, such as storage devices, to essentially be positioned anywhere on the globe. Further, such a storage switch allows a multi-protocol SAN, e.g., one that includes both iSCSI or Fibre Channel, and processes data packets at “wire speed.” To further enable wire-speed processing, a switch in accordance with the invention has “intelligence” distributed to each of its linecards, through which it classifies packets into data and control packets, it performs virtualization functions, and it performs protocol translation functions. A switch in accordance with the invention further performs serverless storage services such as mirroring, snapshot, and replication.

Claims

1. A switch for use in a system for storing and accessing data, the switch comprising:

a plurality of linecards, each linecard including;

at least one port, and

means associated with each port for performing wire speed storage command processing of packets.

2. The switch of claim 1, wherein processing of packets includes at least one of data packet virtualization and data packet protocol translation.

3. The switch of claim 2, wherein processing of packets further includes classifying packets as data packets or control packets.