Assigning a dispersed storage network address range in a maintenance free storage container

• US 9,298,550 B2
• Filed: 03/16/2015
• Issued: 03/29/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/09/2011
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Pure Storage, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Cleversafe Incorporated (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Inventors: Gladwin, S. Christopher, Resch, Jason K., Grube, Gary W., Markison, Timothy W.
• Primary Examiner(s): MASKULINSKI, MICHAEL C
• Application Number:
  US14/658,725
• Publication Number:
  US 20150186214A1
• Time in Patent Office: 379 Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0727 in a storage system, e.g. in a DASD or network based storage system drivers for digital recording or reproducing units G06F3/06; circuits for error detection or correction within digital recording or reproducing units G11B20/18; 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], H04L67/1097
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/076 by exceeding a count or rate limit, e.g. word- or bit count limit
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0766 Error or fault reporting or storing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0775 Content or structure details of the error report, e.g. specific table structure, specific error fields
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1076 Parity data used in redundant arrays of independent storages, e.g. in RAID systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1092 Rebuilding, e.g. when physically replacing a failing disk
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/1408 by using cryptography for digital transmission H04L9/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2211/1028 Distributed, i.e. distributed RAID systems with parity
• 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 67/561 Adding application-functional data or data for application control, e.g. adding metadata
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/04 Protocols for data compression, e.g. ROHC
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/40 for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity, e.g. service redundancy protocols, protocol state redundancy or protocol service redirection management of faults, events, alarms or notifications in data switching networks H04L41/06

Abstract

A maintenance free storage container includes a container housing, storage servers, and a container controller. The container controller includes a processing module that is operable to maintain virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information and to maintain storage server failure information. The processing module is further operable to dispersed storage error encode the virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information to produce encoded mapping slices. The processing module is further operable to send the encoded mapping slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container. The processing module is further operable to dispersed storage error encode the storage server failure information to produce encoded failure data slices. The processing module is further operable to send the encoded failure data slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container.

Claims

1. A maintenance free storage container comprises:

a container housing;

a plurality of storage servers mechanically mounted in the container housing and physically inaccessible when the container housing is substantially sealed; and

a container controller mechanically mounted in the container housing, wherein the container controller includes;

an external network interface;

an internal network interface for operable coupling to the plurality of storage servers; and

a processing module that is operably coupled to the external network interface and the internal network interface, wherein the processing module is operable to;

maintain virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information;

maintain storage server failure information;

dispersed storage error encode the virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information to produce one or more sets of encoded mapping slices;

send, via the external network interface, the one or more sets of encoded mapping slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container;

dispersed storage error encode the storage server failure information to produce one or more sets of encoded failure data slices; and

send, via the external network interface, the one or more sets of encoded failure data slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container.

2. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1, wherein the processing module is further operable to:

receive, via the external network interface, a data access request;

in response to receiving the data access request;

retrieve, via the external network interface, a decode threshold number of encoded mapping slices for each of the one or more sets of encoded mapping slices from the dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container;

decode the decode threshold number of encoded mapping slices for each of the one or more sets of encoded mapping slices to reproduce the virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information;

utilize the virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information to identify one of the plurality of storage servers regarding the data access request; and

provide the data access request to the one of the plurality of storage servers.

3. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1, wherein the processing module is further operable to:

update the virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information to produce updated mapping information;

update the storage server failure information to produce updated storage server failure information;

dispersed storage error encode the updated mapping information to produce one or more sets of encoded updated mapping slices;

send, via the external network interface, the one or more sets of encoded updated mapping slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container;

dispersed storage error encode the updated storage server failure information to produce one or more sets of encoded updated failure data slices; and

send, via the external network interface, the one or more sets of encoded updated failure data slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container.

4. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1, wherein the processing module is operable to maintain the virtual storage server to physical storage server mapping information by:

maintaining a dynamic container address space of the maintenance free storage container based on the storage server failure information; and

managing mapping of container addresses of the dynamic container address space to dispersed storage network (DSN) addresses of an assigned DSN address range.

5. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1, wherein the processing module is operable to maintain the storage server failure information by:

determining storage device failure information for pluralities of storage devices of the plurality of storage servers, wherein the maintenance free storage container allows for multiple storage devices of the pluralities of storage devices to be in a failure mode without replacement and wherein the storage device failure information indicates storage devices of the pluralities of storage devices that are in the failure mode.

6. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1, wherein the processing module is further operable to:

when a write request to an address within an assigned address range of the maintenance free storage container is received;

determining a container address within a dynamic container address space based on the storage server failure information and current address availability within the dynamic container address space;

facilitating the write request to the container address; and

updating current address availability within the dynamic container address space.

7. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1 further comprises:

the processing module being further operable to;

send, to a site controller or a dispersed storage processing device, addressing information regarding storage of the one or more sets of encoded mapping slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container; and

send, to the site controller or the dispersed storage processing device, addressing information regarding the storage of the one or more sets of encoded failure data slices for dispersed storage outside of the maintenance free storage container.

a container controller bypass module operable to;

receive, when the container controller is in a failure mode, a by-pass command from the site controller or from the dispersed storage processing device; and

in response to the by-pass command, provide the site controller or the dispersed storage processing device access to the plurality of storage servers.

8. The maintenance free storage container of claim 1 further comprises:

an environmental control system to control temperature of the maintenance free storage container.