Hitachi, Ltd.

Aki Tomita

Naoki Watanabe

Itaru Nishizawa

Akiyoshi Hashimoto

Nobutoshi Sagawa

Mamoru Sugie

Frederico Buchholz Maciel

Shigekazu Inohara

Hiroaki Odawara

Yoshifumi Takamoto

Hiroki Kanai

Kiyohiro Obara

Naonobu Sukegawa

A storage system coupled to a host computer, including: a non-volatile medium that stores data; a disk cache that temporarily stores data stored in the non-volatile medium, where the disk cache is divided into a plurality of independent disk cache partitions; a control unit that controls an input and an output of data to and from the non-volatile medium; and a memory unit that stores information used by the control unit, including consistency control information setting respective commands permitted for each of the disk cache partitions, to guarantee consistency of the data; wherein the control unit is configured to determine whether or not to execute a requested command for a given disk cache partition, by referring to the consistency control information setting respective commands permitted for each of the disk cache partitions.

Storage system for controlling disk cache

A processor reads a program including a prefetch command and a load command and data from a main memory, and executes the program. The processor includes: a processor core that executes the program; a L2 cache that stores data on the main memory for each predetermined unit of data storage; and a prefetch unit that pre-reads the data into the L2 cache from the main memory on the basis of a request for prefetch from the processor core. The prefetch unit includes: a L2 cache management table including an area in which a storage state is held for each position in the unit of data storage of the L2 cache and an area in which a request for prefetch is reserved; and a prefetch control unit that instructs, the L2 cache to perform the request for prefetch reserved or the request for prefetch from the processor core.

Computer system and control method for controlling processor execution of a prefetech command

A storage network system () includes a sever (), a storage device (), and a management server (). A device control processor () of the server () includes an authentication ID management unit (). The authentication ID management unit () has an authentication ID management table () which manages an authentication ID held at present. A port controller () of the storage device () includes an access control unit (). The access control unit () is provided with an access control table () indicative of a criterion which permits an access from the server (). An access management unit () of the management server () has an operation schedule table () indicative of an operation schedule of operations from the server () to the storage device (), and an access management table () which manages an operation permitted at present.

Storage network system

To eliminate duplicated caching in a storage system with plural disk cache partitions, which are obtained by dividing a disk cache. A storage system includes non-volatile medium that stores data; a disk cache that temporarily stores data to be stored in the non-volatile medium; a control unit that controls input and output of data to and from the non-volatile medium; and a memory unit that stores information used by the control unit. The control unit divides the disk cache into at least one of independent disk cache partitions. The memory unit stores the first information that describes states of respective memory areas in the disk cache, and the second information that indicates states of respective memory areas in the disk cache used by the divided disk cache partitions. The second information includes information that identifies the first information corresponding to the respective memory areas in the disk cache.

When a static logical partition is set in a storage system, wasted resources are generated depending on the load state of the logical partition. Thus, after a logical partition is created, the storage system reconfigures the assignment of resources to the logical partition based on a predetermined configuration. The timing of a resource assignment reconfiguration is based on a job execution schedule, which is associated with a predetermined configuration, and which is executed by a computer utilizing the logical partition. There is also a constitution, wherein a computer sends a predetermined command to the storage system to instruct the storage system to reconfigure the resource assignment. There is also a constitution of a storage system, wherein a resource required for reconfiguring the resource assignment to the logical partition is reserved beforehand, and this reservation is canceled after the passage of a predetermined period of time.

Logical partitioning method for storage system

A storage comprising an object access module for the shared part for implementing advanced I/O provides an interface () for registering and deleting object description data declaring how to store objects within a second storage, in order to reduce the development cost of modules for implementing functions. Also, in order to reduce the total cost of ownership, modules are transferred to the storage through a management computer. The present invention allows the storage for contiguously providing functions effective to a vast range of applications to be provided with lower development cost as well as lower total cost of ownership.

Method and apparatus for implementing extensible network-attached secondary storage

A data I/O system comprises a plurality of storage devices and a controller which controls the storage devices. In the data I/O system, the controller further includes a read/write unit, responsive to the subsequent receipt of a read request and a write request, for reading data stored in the storage devices and writing data in the storage devices, a logical volume management unit for mapping between a logical image of the data storage of a host processor (logical volume) and an actual space in the storage devices, a volume management unit for managing an active primary production volume (P-VOL) and second multiple mirror volumes (S-VOL) created as mirror images of the primary volume, and an S-VOL restoring unit for restoring the data of a first S-VOL with the data of a second S-VOL depending on the type of an error that happens in the first S-VOL.

Data I/O system using a plurality of mirror volumes

A data transforming method and apparatus of a database management system for transforming data within a disk storage device between database data formats, thereby reducing the system load, when converting data formats between database management systems. The invention includes a skeleton program for instructing data transformation and a communication program being provided on a host computer, and a data transformation program for transforming data formats and a communication program being provided on a disk storage. A request sent from the skeleton program via the communication programs to the data transformation program, causes the data format transformation to occur within the disk storage.

Method for transforming data formats between different database systems, an apparatus for executing the method and the program of the method

To provide a logical volume administration method capable of reducing a cost of using a storage, a logical volume is constructed by a steady area corresponding to a task of steadily allocating a disk area and a temporary area corresponding to a task of allocating no disk area until allocation of a disk area is requested. The disk area to be allocated to the temporary area is commonly used by a plurality of logical volumes in a time sharing manner. The disk areas are administered in a lump as a disk pool. The cost to each of customers sharing the temporary area is calculated by total use time&#xd7;use size and is charged.

Logical volume administration method, the service using the method and the memory medium storing the service

A data request analysis unit for accepting and analyzing a request from a client computer, a data conversion program generation unit, and a data conversion unit are provided in a magnetic disk apparatus, the data conversion program generation unit downloads a program module by way of a network as required based on the analysis result obtained by use of the data request analysis unit to generate a data conversion program, and the data conversion unit downloads the conversion program, and converts the type of the data read out from the magnetic memory medium by use of the program, and directly transfers the converted data to the client computer by way of a network interface, thereby, the present invention provides a general purpose magnetic disk apparatus which is capable of flexibly accommodating the request from the client computer, the scalability of the whole system is improved because the data is converted in the magnetic disk apparatus, and the process efficiency of the client computer is improved.

Active memory and memory control method, and heterogeneous data integration use system using the memory and method

A disk storage device comprising; a disk controller for accessing a disk storage medium to read/write data thereon, an object management program for converting a control command containing an object identifier received through a network interface into a control command containing physical address information of the disk storage medium and for feeding the thus converted control command to the disk controller, an object management modification program for modifying a function of the object management program in response to a modification request message received through the network interface, and a processor for carrying out these programs.

Growing community of inventors

Tachikawa, Japan

Aki Tomita