Patent · US Expired

System and method for dynamic storage device expansion support in a storage virtualization environment

US7921262B1 · kind B1 · utility

25Cited by
6References
39Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateDec 18, 2003
Grant dateApr 5, 2011
Priority date
Expiry dateDec 18, 2023

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06F3/0683
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

It has been discovered that systems, methods, apparatus and software can accommodate the addition or removal of available physical storage (storage “expansion”) in a storage virtualization environment while virtual storage devices remain online and generally available to users. When a change to the available storage has occurred, new storage device geometry and configuration information reflecting the change is obtained and/or calculated. This new information is used to update mapping information used by virtualization software and/or to update information used by an operating system to manage storage devices. Such updating occurs while some or all of the virtual storage devices associated with the physical storage devices remain available to users. In some cases, I/O operations targeting a physical device are held, in a manner transparent to a user, while updating occurs.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.