Migration of control in a distributed segmented file system

Abstract

A method of managing segments in a distributed-file system implemented by a plurality of file servers includes determining a segment of the distributed-file system controlled by a first file server for which control is to be migrated, selecting a second file server, that is different from the first file server, to take control of the segment, and moving control of the segment from the first file server to the second file server.

Description

.sctn. 0. CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED ACTIONS[0001] This application claims the benefit of U.S. application Ser. No. 09 / 950,555 filed Sep. 11, 2001, that claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / ______ filed Sep. 12, 2000 entitled "ENTERPRISE DATA STORAGE SYSTEM AND METHOD." This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / 395,839 filed Jul. 15, 2002 entitled "STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF RANDOM METADATA ACCESS USING LARGE NUMBERS OF IBRIX CONTROLLERS." This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / ______ filed Feb. 18, 2003 entitled "METHODS FOR LOCATING ENTITIES IN A DISTRIBUTED FILE SYSTEM TO FACILITATE LOAD BALANCING." This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / ______ filed Feb. 18, 2003 entitled "NON-HIERARCHICAL DISTRIBUTED FILE SYSTEM." This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / ______ filed Feb. 18, 2003 entitled "STORAGE ADM...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0025] Embodiments of the invention may provide one or more of the following advantages. In a distributed-file system, storage capacity can be added easily, data sharing may be permitted, and effective performance may be provided with very large storage capacity and client loads.

Problems solved by technology

Unfortunately, however, SASs are only expandable internally--there is no transparent data sharing between file servers.

Further, with SASs, throughput is limited by the speed of the fixed number of busses internal to the file server.

The disadvantage of this technology is that a file system cannot expand beyond the limits of single NAS machine.

Consequently, administering and maintaining more than a few NAS units, and consequently more than a few file systems, becomes difficult.

Unfortunately, however, SANs are expensive.

Although SANs permit space to be shared among front-end server systems, they do not permit multiple SANs environments to use the same file system.

Also, various incompatible versions of SANs have emerged.

Maintaining and storing a map having every file could, however, limit scalability of the system as the number of files become large.

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