Differential file and system restores from peers and the cloud

• US 8,805,953 B2
• Filed: 04/03/2009
• Issued: 08/12/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 04/03/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Murphy, Elissa E., Mehr, John D., Virk, Navjot, Sosnosky, Lara M., Hamilton, James R.
• Primary Examiner(s): Lazaro, David
• Assistant Examiner(s): SHAW, ROBERT A
• Application Number:
  US12/417,992
• Publication Number:
  US 20100257142A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,957 Days
• Field of Search: 709/217, 707/681
• US Class Current: 709/217
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1446 Point-in-time backing up or restoration of persistent data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1448 Management of the data involved in backup or backup restore
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1451 by selection of backup contents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1453 using de-duplication of the data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1458 Management of the backup or restore process
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1464 for networked environments
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1469 Backup restoration techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/83 the solution involving signatures

Abstract

Provided herein are systems and methodologies for highly efficient restoration in a network-based backup system. As described herein, differential-based analysis can be utilized such that a new complete differential is calculated based on signatures and/or other information relating to a given item to be restored prior to retrieving backup data. Based on the differential, only blocks determined to be unique between the current version of the item and the desired version are transmitted, which can then be merged with non-unique locally present blocks to obtain the fully restored version of the item. Further, a hybrid architecture can be employed, wherein signatures and/or data are stored at a global location within a network as well as one or more local peers. Accordingly, a backup client can obtain information necessary for restoration from either the global location or a nearby peer, thus further reducing latency and bandwidth consumption.

Claims

1. A client system for restoring information from a network backup system, comprising:

a memory and a processor that are respectively configured to store and execute instructions, including instructions organized into;

a differential component that is configured to identify, for a data item to be restored, one or more portions of the data item that are different between a current version of the data item and a target version of the data item based on both a first differential, calculated at the client system, between the current version of the data item and the target version of the data item and on a second differential, calculated at a backup location that is remote from the client system, between the current version of the data item and the target version of the data item;

a location determination component that is configured to determine a plurality of network locations at which the one or more identified portions are stored and to select one of the determined network locations, wherein the plurality of network locations includes at least one location associated with a cloud service provider; and

a restore component that is configured to retrieve the one or more identified portions from the selected location and to restore the current version of the data item to the target version of the data item with the retrieved one or more identified portions.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the differential component is further configured to identify the one or more portions at least in part by comparing respective portion signatures associated with the portions of the current version of the data item to respective portion signatures associated with corresponding portions of the target version of the data item.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the location determination component comprises an index lookup component that is configured to look up the plurality of network locations from an index that is at a predetermined network location.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the index comprises a listing of the one or more portions of the data item and pointers to at least one location for each of the one or more portions.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the plurality of network locations also includes:

a location of a remote device connected to the client system via a wide area network; and

at least one of;

a location of a local peer device is that connected to the client system via a local area network and is that configured to store the one or more portions of the data item; and

a location of a local super peer device that is connected to the client system via the local area network and that is configured to store the one or more portions of the data item as well as an index that includes a listing of the one or more portions and pointers to at least one location for each of the one or more portions.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the location determination component is further configured to select one of the determined network locations based at least in part on prioritizing the location of the local peer device or super peer device over the location of the remote device.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the location determination component comprises a network analysis component that is configured to select one of the determined network locations based at least in part on network loading, network location uptime, proximity of the respective network locations to the client system, and expected bandwidth consumption for retrieving the identified portions from the respective network locations.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein devices at each of the plurality of network locations are configured to store the data items and one or more incremental updates to the data items.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the restore component is further configured to restore the target version of the data item by merging the retrieved portions with one or more portions of the current version of the data item.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the restore component is further configured to merge the retrieved portions with one or more portions of the current version of the data item at least in part by replacing one or more portions of the current version of the data item with corresponding portions of the target version of the data item.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the data item to be restored is a system image.

12. A method of performing a differential restore of one or more files, comprising:

identifying a locally available version of a file stored on at least one memory of a computing device;

identifying a target version of the file to which the locally available version of the file is to be restored to;

identifying, by the computing device, respective segments of the target version of the file that differ from corresponding segments of the locally available version of the file based on calculations performed by at least both of the computing device and by a backup server computing device that is remote from the computing device;

obtaining each identified segment, including for each identified segment;

determining a plurality of network data stores from which the identified segment can be retrieved, the plurality of network data stores including at least one network data store of a cloud service provider;

selecting one network data store from the plurality of determined network data stores; and

obtaining, by the computing device, the identified segment from the selected network data store; and

restoring, by the computing device, the target version of the file from the current version of the file and from the identified and obtained segments.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the identifying the respective segments comprises:

comparing signatures associated with segments of the target version of the file to signatures associated with corresponding segments of the locally available version of the file.

14. The method of claim 12, wherein the obtaining each identified segment further comprises:

obtaining a first identified segment from a first network data store; and

obtaining a second identified segment from a second network data store, wherein the first network data store is different than the second network data store.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the network data stores includes:

a cloud-based network data store of the cloud service provider, the cloud-based network data store being connected to the computing device via a wide area network;

a local peer network data store that is connected to the computing device via a local area network and that is configured to store backup segments; and

a local super peer network data store that is connected to the computing device via the local area network and that is configured to store the backup segments as well as an index that includes a listing of the backup segments and pointers to the network data stores from which the backup segments can be retrieved.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the selecting one network data store comprises:

applying a first preference level to the local peer network data store and the local super peer network data store; and

applying a second preference level to the cloud-based network data store, wherein the first preference level is indicative of a preference over the second preference level.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein the selecting one network data store comprises selecting the one network data store based at least in part on at least one of network loading between the computing device and the network data stores, availability of the network data stores, and anticipated bandwidth consumption associated with retrieving the identified segment from the cloud-based network data store.

18. The method of claim 12, wherein the restoring comprises merging the obtained segments of the target version of the file with segments of the locally available version of the file.

19. The method of claim 12, wherein the file is a portion of a system image or the system image.

20. An apparatus for restoring information from a hybrid peer-to-peer/cloud-based backup system, the apparatus comprising:

means for conducting a signature-based comparison between blocks of a locally available version of a file and corresponding blocks of a target version of the file and for identifying at least one block of the target version of the file that does not identically correspond to any block of the locally available version of the file based on both the signature-based comparison and on another signature-based comparison that was calculated at a remote backup location;

means for determining a plurality of network devices at which the at least one block of the target version of the file is available for retrieval and for selecting one of the determined plurality of network devices as a source for the at least one block of the target version of the file, wherein the plurality of network devices includes at least one device of a cloud service provider; and

means for obtaining the at least one block of the target version of the file from the selected one of the determined plurality of network devices and for merging the at least one block of the target version of the file with one or more blocks of the locally available version of the file to restore the target version of the file.