International Business Machines Corporation

Other

Lisa R Martinez

Juan A Coronado

Christina Ann Lara

Beth Ann Peterson

Sara Megan Coronado

Jennifer Shinobu Shioya

Clint Alan Hardy

Mark Sean Fleming

Lee Charles LaFrese

Raul Eduardo Saba

James E Olson

Brian Dow Clark

Lu Nguyen

Phu Nguyen

Jayson Elliott Tsingine

Todd M Tosseth

Robbie Allison

Paul Allison

Robert J McNamara

A computer-implemented method for preemptively migrating a failing extent includes receiving information of one or more failure conditions associated with an extent stored in a first storage portion of a first storage tier; predicting a failure of the extent based on the information; and selecting a second storage portion located in one of a plurality of storage tiers. The method also includes migrating the extent to the selected second storage portion. The selected second storage portion to which the extent is migrated is located in a lower storage tier. The lower storage tier includes less expensive and/or slower-to-access storage media than the first storage tier.

Preemptive relocation of failing data

In one embodiment of file integrity preservation in accordance with the present description, a file is subdivided into a plurality of subfiles, and a write update originally targeted for a portion of that file contained within one of the subfiles, is instead directed to a temporary copy subfile. As a consequence, the temporary copy subfile which is updated with the write data, may be scanned for viruses or other malware separately from the original file and its corresponding original subfile. If the temporary copy subfile passes the scanning test, the originally targeted file may be updated with the updated contents of the clean temporary copy subfile. Conversely, in the event that the write update introduced malicious software to the temporary copy subfile, the original file and its corresponding original subfile remain uncontaminated by the write update. Other aspects are also described.

File integrity preservation

Embodiments of the present disclosure may relate to methods and a computer program product for allowing writes based on a granularity level. The method for a storage server may include receiving a received granularity level for a particular volume of a storage device of a client computer including an effective duration for the received granularity level. The method may include receiving an anticipated write to the particular volume at an anticipated write granularity level. The method may include verifying whether the anticipated write granularity level substantially matches the received granularity level at the effective duration. The method may also include writing, in response to the anticipated write granularity level substantially matching the received granularity level at the effective duration, the anticipated write to the particular volume for the received granularity level.

Queuing read requests based on write requests

Data access to a storage tier on a client in a multi-tiered storage system

According to one embodiment, a method for preemptively migrating a failing extent includes receiving information of one or more failure conditions associated with an extent stored in a first storage portion of a first storage tier; predicting a failure of the extent based on the information; selecting a second storage portion located in one of a plurality of storage tiers; and migrating the extent to the selected second storage portion.

A primary storage controller determines that a quarantined area of the primary storage controller cannot be repaired, wherein the quarantined area is infected with a virus. A query is sent to a secondary storage controller to determine whether the secondary storage controller has data that is free of virus in an area of the secondary storage controller corresponding to the quarantined area of the primary storage controller. In response to receiving a notification that the secondary storage controller has data that is free of virus, the primary storage controller is repaired to remove the virus.

Recovery of an infected and quarantined file in a primary storage controller from a secondary storage controller

A method for upgrading microcode in a multi-module storage system may include selecting a first module from two or more modules and operating the first module using an upgraded microcode. The method may include monitoring the performance of the first module by a second module of the two or more modules and rendering an indication of performance of the first module. Further, the method may include determining whether the indication of performance of the first module is greater than or equal to a performance metric.

Microcode upgrade in a storage system

A method to reduce delays associated with restoring quarantined files is disclosed. In one embodiment, such a method includes maintaining, for a file, a 'current' pointer pointing to a current copy of the file and a 'backup' pointer pointing to a virus-free backup copy of the file. The method receives an I/O request (a read or write request) to access the file. In response to receiving the I/O request, the method scans the current copy of the file for viruses. In the event a virus is discovered in the current copy, the method modifies the &#x201c;current&#x201d; pointer to point to the backup copy. This causes the backup copy to become the new current copy. The method then executes the I/O request with respect to the new current copy. A corresponding system and computer program product are also disclosed and claimed herein.

Reducing delays associated with restoring quarantined files

Systems, methods, and computer program products for providing operating system (O/S) redundancy in a computing system are provided. One system includes a host computing device, a plurality of memory devices, and a sub-loader coupled between the host computing device and the plurality of memory devices. Each memory device stores a respective O/S and the sub-loader is configured such that the plurality of memory devices appear transparent to the host computing device. One method includes designating, a first logical unit device as a primary logical unit device and subsequently determining that the first logical unit device is unresponsive. The designation is removed from the first logical unit device and a second logical unit device is designated as a new primary logical unit device. One computer program product includes instructions for performing the above method.

Pool of devices providing operating system redundancy

A method for more efficiently scanning files for viruses includes determining a vulnerability date associated with a virus, wherein the vulnerability date is related to a release date of the virus. In certain embodiments, the vulnerability date is a user-tunable amount of time before or after the release date. The method further determines, on a storage system, which files that have been updated since the vulnerability date. These files are scanned for the virus in a first batch. The method further determines which files have not been updated since the vulnerability date. These files are scanned for the virus in a second batch. Because files in the first batch have been updated since the vulnerability date, scanning the first batch may be given priority over scanning the second batch. A corresponding system and computer program product are also disclosed.

Virus-release-date-based priority virus scanning

Storage area network (SAN) components contain a processor configured to provide a first event handling module that can receive an error event at a first hardware component of the storage area network. A database is accessed that contains associations between error event data and potential sources of errors. A plurality of hardware components are identified using the database and error event data. The hardware components are ranked and one is selected based on the ranking. An error notification is sent to a second event handling module of the hardware component. Based upon the response of the second event handling module, an error handling procedure is carried out.

Error identification and handling in storage area networks

Provided are a method, a system, and a computer program product in which a secondary storage controller copies a file stored in a primary storage controller. The secondary storage controller performs an anti-virus scan on the copied file. A result of the anti-virus scan is transmitted to the primary storage controller.

Growing community of inventors

Escondido, CA, United States of America

Lisa R Martinez