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Dispersive storage area networks

  • US 9,116,734 B1
  • Filed: 01/30/2012
  • Issued: 08/25/2015
  • Est. Priority Date: 01/14/2011
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
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1. A dispersive storage area network (SAN), comprising:

  • (a) an electronic device having a network interface and software loaded on the electronic device configured to spawn a plurality of respective virtual machines that each virtualizes network capabilities of the network interface such that a respective virtual network connection is provided; and

    (b) a plurality of storage devices, each storage device having data stored thereon representing a portion of stored information, and each storage device having software loaded thereon configured to spawn a plurality of respective virtual machines that each virtualizes network capabilities of that storage device such that a respective virtual network connection is provided;

    (c) wherein the dispersive SAN is configured to store information from the electronic device by(i) breaking up, at the electronic device, the information into a plurality of portions;

    (ii) spawning, at the electronic device, a plurality of virtual machines that each virtualizes network capabilities of the network interface such that a virtual network connection is provided, and(iii) storing each portion of the plurality of portions at a respective storage device of the plurality of storage devices by, for each respective portion,(A) communicating, from the electronic device using one of the provided virtual network connections, data packets containing the respective portion of the information to the respective storage device,(B) receiving, at a virtual machine of the respective storage device, the respective portion, and(C) storing, at the respective storage device, the respective portion;

    (d) wherein the electronic device is configured to thereafter access the stored information by(i) spawning, at the electronic device, a plurality of virtual machines that each virtualizes network capabilities of the network interface such that a virtual network connection is provided,(ii) receiving, at each of the spawned virtual machines, data packets communicated by a respective storage device of the plurality of storage devices using a virtual network connection provided by a virtual machine of that storage device, the received data packets containing data representing one of the portions of the information,(iii) assembling the data received at each of the spawned virtual machines into the stored information;

    (e) wherein data in at least some portions of the plurality of portions is redundant to other data in the at least some portions of the plurality of portions such that the stored information can be reassembled even if data is not received from all of the storage devices of the plurality of storage devices.

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