Management of copy services relationships via policies specified on resource groups

• US 8,667,497 B2
• Filed: 06/11/2012
• Issued: 03/04/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 12/09/2010
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Ripberger, Richard A.
• Primary Examiner(s): An, Meng
• Assistant Examiner(s): Lee, James J
• Application Number:
  US13/493,142
• Publication Number:
  US 20120317581A1
• Time in Patent Office: 631 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 718/104
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2069 Management of state, configuration or failover
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0604 Improving or facilitating administration, e.g. storage management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0605 by facilitating the interaction with a user or administrator
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0631 by allocating resources to storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/065 Replication mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/067 Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0683 Plurality of storage devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/50 Allocation of resources, e.g. of the central processing unit [CPU]

Abstract

At least one additional resource group attribute is defined to specify at least one policy prescribing a copy services relationship between two of the storage resources. Pursuant to a request to establish the copy services relationship between the two storage resources, each of the two storage resources exchange resource group labels corresponding to which of the plurality of resource groups the two storage resources are assigned, and each of the two storage resources validates the requested copy services relationship and the resource group label of an opposing one of the two storage resources against the individual ones of the at least one additional resource group attribute in the resource group object to determine if the copy services relationship may proceed.

Claims

1. A method of prescribing copy services relationships for storage resources in a computing environment by a processor device, comprising:

organizing the storage resources into a plurality of resource groups that are each uniquely identified by a resource group label, each of the storage resources having at least one of a plurality of resource group attributes associating a storage resource object with the plurality of resource groups and associating at least one policy via the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes in the plurality of resource groups with the storage resources;

defining one of the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes to specify the at least one policy prescribing the copy services relationships between the storage resources associated with the plurality of resource groups; and

utilizing, by the at least one policy prescribing the copy services relationships, a resource group label attribute of the resource group to identify at least one of the plurality of resource groups within a storage subsystem of the computing environment, wherein the resource group label attribute is used in conjunction with the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes in one of the plurality of resource groups and in one of a plurality of user ID accounts, and

performing at least one of;

defining, by the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes, pattern adapted to be compared to each of a set of resource group labels such that the resource group labels may be determined to perform one of matching and not matching the pattern, and

considering the at least one of the plurality of resource groups to be included within the scope of the resource scope attribute for purposes of making a policy decision to perform one of allowing and disallowing copy services operations;

wherein the copy services relationships between the storage resources associated with the plurality of resource groups and the storage resources that are a partner of the copy services relationships are assigned the one of the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes in a manner dependent on a copy services request, wherein pursuant to a request to establish the copy services relationships between the two storage resources;

each of the two storage resources exchange the resource group label corresponding to which of the plurality of resource groups the two storage resources are assigned, and

each of the two storage resources validate the request and the resource group labels of the opposing the storage resources against the one of the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes defining a copy relationship policy in the storage resources associated with selected ones of the plurality of resource groups to determine if the copy services relationships may proceed.

2. The method of claim 1, further including, for each of a plurality of available users of the storage resources having a user resource scope attribute for allowing access to the storage resources in at least one of the plurality of resource groups, defining the user resource scope attribute to delineate an authority of each of the plurality of available users to perform at least one of initiation and management of the copy services operations on an accessible storage resource, wherein the authority of each of the plurality of available users to access the storage resources is determined, which of the plurality of storage resources that the copy services operation is acting upon being in that of the plurality of resource groups having resource group labels that are within a scope of the user resource scope attribute.

3. The method of claim 1, further including defining through the one of the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes, one of an authority for one of a host and a user attachment interface type in communication with at least one of the storage resources to perform at least one of initiation and management of the copy services operations on a storage resource accessible to the host.

4. The method of claim 1, further including defining, the one of the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes, a requirement for a portion of the volume address of both a source volume and a target volume of a requested copy services relationships to be identical, wherein the portion of the volume address is one of a high order bit portion specifying a logical subsystem associated with the portion of the volume address and a low order bit portion that identifies the portion of the volume address within one of a logical subsystem.

5. The method of claim 1, further including:

adapting the plurality of resource groups to contain a resource group policy attribute containing a resource scope value that is used to validate resource group labels of an opposing volume resource grouping,

performing by the resource scope value one of;

precluding all the resource group labels,

allowing all the resource group labels, and

allowing at least one of the resource group labels by a pattern matching algorithm, and

defining the resource group label attribute and the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes, and further defining a schema for the at least one of the plurality of resource group attributes and the resource group label attribute, thereby giving the resource scope value authority to perform the at least one of initiation and management of at least one of the copy services relationships on an accessible resource such that the scope of access is greater than those of a plurality of resource scope values that are lower in a hierarchy of the at least one of the copy services relationships.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of a plurality of group policy attributes is prescribed by a copy services global resource scope that limits both a source and a target scope of the copy services relationships of any type to a specified resource scope, wherein a resource group policy is prescribed by a source resource scope that limits a source volume, and a target resource scope that limits a target volume that may participate in the copy services relationships of a specified type with the source and the target volumes in the plurality of resource groups.