Loosely coupled mass storage computer cluster having a set of data storage controllers interoperable for reading and writing data objects
First Claim
1. A data cluster, comprising:
- three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process;
the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members receiving individual data service requests for a data object and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A method and apparatus redundantly store data, in particular video data objects, in a distributed computer system having at least three processor systems, each processor system being connected in point to point two way channel interconnection with each other processor system. The data is stored in a redundant fashion both at the computer system level as well as the processor system level. Accordingly, the failure of a single processor does not adversely affect the integrity of the data. The computer system can also overlay a switching system connected in a ring fashion for providing a fault tolerance to the failure of a single connected processor system at the switch level. Accordingly, there results a fault tolerant data distribution system.
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Citations
35 Claims
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1. A data cluster, comprising:
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three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process; the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members receiving individual data service requests for a data object and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29)
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30. A method of accessing data storage within a data cluster, the data cluster comprising three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process, the method comprising at the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members:
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receiving individual data service requests for a data object; and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process. - View Dependent Claims (31)
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32. A data cluster, comprising:
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three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process; and the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members receiving individual data service requests for a data object and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process, the data blocks being stored with metadata for accessing the data object and the metadata comprising information for determining locations of individual data blocks.
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33. A method of accessing data storage within a data cluster, the data cluster comprising three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process, the method comprising at the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members:
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receiving individual data service requests for a data object; and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process, the data blocks being stored with metadata for accessing the data object and the metadata comprising information for determining locations of individual data blocks.
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34. A data cluster, comprising:
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three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process; and the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members receiving individual data service requests for a data object and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process; the data storage controller of the at least one cluster member determining locations of the data blocks comprising the data object based on an individual block number to be located, fragment size, and total number of the data blocks comprising the data object.
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35. A method of accessing data storage within a data cluster, the data cluster comprising three or more cluster members that store a plurality of data objects, each cluster member comprising data storage and a processor that executes a data storage controller, wherein each of the plurality of data objects comprise data blocks that are stored across the cluster members according to a distributed, redundant storage process, the method comprising at the data storage controller of at least one of the cluster members:
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receiving individual data service requests for a data object; and interoperating with other data storage controllers within a set of the three or more cluster members to access the corresponding data storage to read or write data blocks comprising the data object according to the distributed, redundant storage process; determining locations of the data blocks based on an individual block number to be located, fragment size, and total number of the data blocks comprising the data object.
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Specification