Hitachi, Ltd.

Noboru Morishita

Yasutomo Yamamoto

Yoshiaki Eguchi

Ai Satoyama

Akira Yamamoto

Masayuki Yamamoto

Hideo Saito

Toshio Nakano

Seiichi Higaki

Hiroshi Arakawa

Akira Deguchi

Yusuke Nonaka

Norio Shimozono

Hisaharu Takeuchi

Sadahiro Sugimoto

Yoichi Mizuno

Seiji Kaneko

Akihiko Araki

Hisao Honma

Tadato Nishina

Takashi Oeda

Masakuni Agetsuma

Kazuyoshi Serizawa

Shunji Kawamura

Tomohiro Yoshihara

Masafumi Nozawa

Toshiomi Moriki

Kiyohiro Obara

Keiichi Matsuzawa

Eiju Katsuragi

Yoshihiro Yoshii

Hisashi Takamatsu

Shintaro Kudo

Toshiya Seki

Yusuke Saito

Yutaka Ohshima

Katsuya Sato

Yusutomo Yamamoto

Tomoki Sekiyama

A computer system includes a plurality of servers connected to each other via a communication line, each server including a memory and a processor, an OS program and a storage program. The storage program is executed by the processor, and one of the plurality of servers acts as a request source server while one of the other servers acts as a request destination server. When the request source server reads data from the request destination server, the processor of the request source server executes the storage program to transmit a data read request to the request destination server. The processor of the request destination server then executes a storage memory driver incorporated in the OS program to read the requested data from an own memory and transmit the read data to the request source server. The request source server then executes the storage program to acquire the data.

Computer system, processing method, and driver program

A storage control system reads a data set from a storage apparatus if necessary in response to an I/O request. A data set contains data and an address. The storage control system performs an all-type address check which is a check to determine whether one of a first address and second address which correspond to a read-target data set in address translation information, which is information indicating a mapping relationship between one or more first addresses and one or more second addresses, matches the address among the data and address contained in the data set. The one or more first addresses are each an address which belongs to the first address type. The one or more second addresses are each an address which belongs to the second address type. The storage control system performs processing according to the I/O request when the result of the all-type address check is true.

Storage control system and storage control method

This storage system comprises a block interface, a block control unit, a file control unit, and shared memory. The file control unit and block control unit are coupled via a first memory-through path structured to pass through a first area of the shared memory, and via a second memory-through path structured to pass through a second area of the shared memory. The block control unit has a protocol control unit and a virtual driver; exchanges control information for the file control unit with the file control unit via the first memory-through path; uses the virtual driver to convert an I/O request passed from the file control unit via the second memory-through path and processes the result with a protocol processing unit; and bypasses the virtual driver and uses the protocol processing unit to process a block I/O request transferred from the block interface via a physical path.

Storage system and storage control method

A computer system, having: a physical computer, which includes a processor and a memory; and an external apparatus, which is coupled to the physical computer and which includes a storage apparatus, the physical computer further includes: a virtualization module for providing at least one virtual machine; a first failure monitoring module for detecting a failure in the physical computer and the virtualization module; a first memory dump module for copying, to the external apparatus, a first area in the memory which is allocated to the virtualization module; a second failure monitoring module for detecting a failure in the virtual machine; and a second memory dump module for copying, to the external apparatus, a second area in the memory which is allocated by the virtualization module to the virtual machine.

Computer system and memory dump method

In a storage system, first and second controllers have respective first and second buffer and cache areas. The first controller stores write data in accordance with a write request in the first cache area without involving the first buffer area and to transfer the stored write data to the second cache area without involving the second buffer area. The first controller is configured to determine which of the first and second cache areas is to be used as a copy source and to be used as a copy destination depending on whether the storing of the first write data in the first cache area had been successful or on whether the transfer of the write data from the first cache area to the second controller had been successful, and by copying data from the copy source to the copy destination, recovers data in an area related to a transfer failure.

A storage system is provided with a memory region, a cache memory region, and a processor. The memory region stores the time relation information that indicates a time relationship of a data element that has been stored into the cache memory region and that is to be written to the logical region and a snapshot acquisition point of time to the primary volume. The processor judges whether or not the data element that has been stored into the cache memory region is a snapshot configuration element based on the time relation information for the data element that is to be written to a logical region of a write destination that conforms to the write request that specifies the primary volume and that has been stored into the cache memory region. In the case in which the result of the judgment is positive, the processor saves the data element to the secondary volume for holding a snapshot image in which the snapshot configuration element is a configuration element, and a data element of a write target is then stored into the cache memory region.

A second storage maps a migration source volume to a virtual volume of a migration destination volume according to storage virtualization technology. A host system including a host switches an access path from an access path to the migration source volume to an access path to the migration destination volume. The second storage executes copy processing of migrating, from the migration source volume to the migration destination volume, data in an assigned area of a virtual volume according to thin provisioning of the migration source volume based on the information contained in the first thin provisioning information in the first storage, and copying that data from the migration destination volume to a virtual volume according to thin provisioning of a copy destination volume in the second storage. The second storage associates the virtual volume of the copy destination volume with the migration destination volume in substitute for the original virtual volume.

Data migration system and data migration method

A storage system includes a first storage apparatus and a second storage apparatus. The first storage apparatus includes a capacity pool that is partitioned into multiple pool pages and includes a storage area of an external logical volume provided by at least one storage apparatus. The second storage apparatus provides first virtual volume which is a virtual logical volume comprising multiple first virtual areas. In a case of receiving a write request from the computer to a virtual area in the first virtual volume to which a page is not allocated, an unallocated pool page of the external logical volume is allocated to the virtual area. An authority to allocate the unallocated pool page of the external logical volume is assigned to the first storage apparatus.

Storage system comprising multiple storage apparatuses with both storage virtualization function and capacity virtualization function

In a storage system which includes a plurality of microprocessors, it is desired to prevent delay in I/O responses due to synchronous processing waiting for asynchronous processing, while still ensuring the throughput of asynchronous processing. In a plurality of microprocessors possessed by a controller, synchronous processors and asynchronous processors are mixed together. The synchronous processors are microprocessors whose duty is to perform synchronous processing and not to perform asynchronous processing. And the asynchronous processors are microprocessors whose duty is to perform asynchronous processing and not to perform synchronous processing.

Storage system having plural microprocessors, and processing allotment method for storage system having plural microprocessors

A plurality of modules () and () comprise a plurality of virtual volumes with which the same volume identification number is associated. A module (), which receives a write request from a computer, searches for an unallocated real area from among a plurality of real areas in the module () rather than from among a plurality of real areas in the other module () if a real area has not been allocated to a write-targeted virtual area in accordance with the write request. The module () allocates the real area retrieved from the module () to the write-targeted virtual area, and writes data according to the write request to this real area.

Storage system comprising plurality of storage system modules

A first virtual storage and a second virtual storage share an external LU (Logical Unit) inside an external storage. The first virtual storage comprises a first LU, which comprises multiple first virtual areas and conforms to thin provisioning, and an external capacity pool, which is a storage area based on the external LU, and which is partitioned into multiple external pages, which are sub-storage areas. The second virtual storage comprises a second LU, which comprises multiple second virtual areas and conforms to thin provisioning. In a data migration from the first LU to the second LU, for a data migration from a first virtual area, to which an external page has been allocated, to a second virtual area, the first virtual storage notifies the second virtual storage of a migration-source address, which is an address of the first virtual area, and an external address, which is an address of the external page that has been allocated to this virtual area, and the second virtual storage stores a corresponding relationship between the notified migration-source address and external address.

There are a loose coupling and a tight coupling as the coupling configurations for a first module and a second module. The loose coupling is a coupling configuration in which the first and second modules are coupled together by way of a front-end path, and the first module is not able to access a second storage resource. The tight coupling is a coupling configuration in which the first and second modules are coupled together by way of a back-end path, and the first module is able to access the second storage resource. A switch from the loose coupling to the tight coupling is performed using the following processing flow without the first and second modules being partitioned into respectively independent storage modules. Specifically, first, the first and second modules are coupled together by way of the back-end path, and next, the first module merges information denoted by second management information from the second storage resource with first management information via the back-end path.

Storage system configured from plurality of storage modules and method for switching coupling configuration of storage modules

The present invention provides a storage system for migrating a storage apparatus. The storage system comprises the steps of: defining a logical volume on a storage apparatus to be migrated coupled to a first controller as a local volume coupled to a second controller; setting to receive an access targeted to the logical volume through an input/output port of the storage apparatus to be migrated, as the local volume coupled to the second controller; blocking the input/output port of the storage apparatus to be migrated; connecting the other input/output port of the storage apparatus to the second control apparatus.

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Yokohama, Japan

Noboru Morishita