41 results about "Global file system" patented technology

In a switched file system, a file switching device is logically positioned between clients and file servers and communicates with the clients and the file servers using standard network file protocols. The file switching device appears as a server to the client devices and as a client to the file servers. The file switching device aggregates storage from multiple file servers into a global filesystem and presents a global namespace to the client devices. The file switching device typically supports a “native” mode for integrating legacy files into the global namespace and an “extended” mode for actively managing files across one or more file servers. Typically, native-mode files may be accessed directly or indirectly via the file switching device, while extended-mode files may be accessed only through the file switching device. The file switching device may manage file storage using various types of rules, e.g., for managing multiple storage tiers or for applying different types of encoding schemes to files. Rules may be applied to pre-existing files.

A virtual file system and method. The system architecture enables a plurality of underlying file systems running on various file servers to be “virtualized” into one or more “virtual volumes” that appear as a local file system to clients that access the virtual volumes. The system also enables the storage spaces of the underlying file systems to be aggregated into a single virtual storage space, which can be dynamically scaled by adding or removing file servers without taking any of the file systems offline and in a manner transparent to the clients. This functionality is enabled through a software “virtualization” filter on the client that intercepts file system requests and a virtual file system driver on each file server. The system also provides for load balancing file accesses by distributing files across the various file servers in the system, through migration of data files between servers.

In a switched file system, a file switching device is logically positioned between clients and file servers and communicates with the clients and the file servers using standard network file protocols. The file switching device appears as a server to the client devices and as a client to the file servers. The file switching device aggregates storage from multiple file servers into a global filesystem and presents a global namespace to the client devices. The file switching device typically supports a “native” mode for integrating legacy files into the global namespace and an “extended” mode for actively managing files across one or more file servers. Typically, native-mode files may be accessed directly or indirectly via the file switching device, while extended-mode files may be accessed only through the file switching device. The file switching device may manage file storage using various types of rules, e.g., for managing multiple storage tiers or for applying different types of encoding schemes to files. Rules may be applied to pre-existing files.

The consistency callback mechanisms employed by local file systems such as NTFS and distributed file systems such as DDS, NFS and CIFS are extended to provide a shared memory foundation for efficiently broadcasting real-time high definition video from a source object to large numbers of viewers via the Internet. Distributed applications such as video viewing client applications establish connections to a common distributed file system object, and then each application registers with the underlying distributed file system to receive notifications whenever the video source modifies the source object. The data required to update images maintained by viewing clients is included in notification messages. The distributed file system employs a network of proxy cache nodes. Proxy cache nodes receive notification messages (complete with image update data) and update their cached images of the source object and then retransmit the notification messages towards the viewing clients using IP multicast techniques. In this manner, the distributed file system's consistency mechanism efficiently employs network resources to enable the real-time distribution of video content streams.

A content management system and method are disclosed having one or more shared file systems located on one or more networks having a firewall. The content management system includes an explorer client, a mounting client, and a gateway. The gateway is in communication with both the explorer client and the mounting client. The explorer client forms a profile of a user device by determining the characteristics of the user device. The mounting client determines the capabilities of the one or more file systems and where content resides on each of the one or more file systems. The gateway then creates a virtual abstraction layer based on the profile of the user device and the capabilities of the one or more file systems.

A shared storage distributed file system is presented that provides applications with transparent access to a storage area network (SAN) attached storage device. This is accomplished by providing clients read access to the devices over the SAN and by requiring most write activity to be serialized through a network attached storage (NAS) server. Both the clients and the NAS server are connected to the SAN-attached device over the SAN. Direct read access to the SAN attached device is provided through a local file system on the client. Write access is provided through a remote file system on the client that utilizes the NAS server. A supplemental read path is provided through the NAS server for those circumstances where the local file system is unable to provide valid data reads.

Consistency is maintained by comparing modification times in the local and remote file systems. Since writes occur over the remote file systems, the consistency mechanism is capable of flushing data caches in the remote file system, and invalidating metadata and real-data caches in the local file system. It is possible to utilize unmodified local and remote file systems in the present invention, by layering over the local and remote file systems a new file system. This new file system need only be installed at each client, allowing the NAS server file systems to operate unmodified. Alternatively, the new file system can be combined with the local file system.

A mirror file systems (MFS) is a virtual file system that links two or more file systems together and mirrors between them in real time. The file systems linked and mirrored through the mirror file system can be a local file system connected to a physical device, or a network file system exported by a remote system on a network. The mirroring mechanism is established by linking a file system to another file system on a single directory through an MFS mounting protocol. User applications perform normal file system operation and file/directory operation system calls like open, read, write and close functions from the pathname of either file system. When updates occur, such as a write operation, the MFS mechanism ensures that all data updates go to both the file systems in real time.

Implicit journaling of a file operation relating to a file stored in a flash memory is performed by locking a semaphore corresponding to the file on which a file operation is to be performed, by initializing journaling of the file operation using the file map, by performing the file operation on the file, by completing journaling of the file operation using a file map corresponding to the file, and unlocking the semaphore. Additionally or alternatively, a file system is placed in a stable state following an interruption occurring during a file operation by scanning File Maps corresponding to the files, determining whether a file operation is incomplete based on validity flags contained in the file maps, and performing remediation so as to eliminate the incomplete file operation.

File system restoration is made more flexible through the use of indicators of individual file restoration status throughout the restoration process. Such indicators are particularly useful in the restoration of large file systems where, for example, the number of files may range upwards of several hundred million. Since file system restoration for large systems takes such a relatively long time, the present invention provides various degrees of individual file access even as the restoration process is being carried out. During file system restoration times, file access may be full or limited to a file's attributes. Most advantageously, the present invention is capable of providing full, dynamically driven (on-demand) file access even during file system restoration operations.

The invention prevents improper deletes of file system objects during rescan synchronizations of local and remote (cloud) file systems. File and folder deletes are validated (confirmed) during a rescan synchronization using events generated for a steady state synchronization process. Any improper deletes are fenced and not allowed to proceed during synchronization. A method for synchronizing local (LFS) and remote (RFS) file systems includes monitoring the LFS for changes, generating a first set of events as part of a first synchronization routine (e.g., a steady state synchronization routine), generating a second set of events as part of a second (rescan) synchronization routine, validating selected events of the second set with events of the first set to determine whether each of the selected events of the second set is valid or invalid, and synchronizing the file systems based on the events of the second set excluding those that have been invalidated. Storage systems are also disclosed.

The invention provides a method for realizing a shared storage pool by utilizing a Linux global file system. A Linux global file system (GFS) is arranged in an SAN storage network, thereby realizing a small-scale cluster shared storage pool. According to the method, a shared storage pool for unified management, parallel reading and writing, data protection and elastic expansion can be provided for cluster nodes; SAN equipment-based cluster storage file system configures a physical storage raw device into a flexible logical storage volume group; storage space that is shared globally and is oriented to a node group is established on the logical volume group; a client mounts a GFS to a local end to realize parallel reading and writing operation on the file system; and a distributed log management system and a fault node isolation mechanism provide functions of data protection and disaster recovery for a shared storage pool.

The invention provides a method, a device and a system for sharing a storage pool by a cluster. The method comprises the following steps of: configuring a global file system (GFS) to be shared by the cluster based on a storage area network (SAN), and processing reading-writing operations of each client node in the cluster in parallel; and mounting a part of subareas in the global file system to a local server for the reading-writing operations according to needs by using each client node in the cluster. In the method, a network level high-efficiency data sharing way is provided, the parallel file reading-writing of a plurality of users is supported, and flexible online capacity expansion and data equilibrium distribution technologies are supported.

One aspect of the present invention provides an operation for recovering lost space and maintaining data consistency in a storage environment by providing a two-way orphan reconciliation method for extremely large file systems, such as a Hierarchical Storage Management (HSM) system which manages billions of files. This highly scalable and parallelizable orphan identification process may be used in a HSM controlled environment to enable the execution of a two-way file orphan check. In one embodiment, this orphan check identifies file system client orphans and server object orphans in a single pass by comparing a queue containing a list of migrated files on a storage repository server with a queue containing a list of stub files on a file system. If the queue elements do not match, a file system orphan or server object orphan can appropriately be identified.

A cloud-native global file system, in which one or more filers are associated with a volume of a versioned files system in a private, public or hybrid cloud object store, is augmented to include a rapid ransomware recovery service. Upon detecting a ransomware attack associated with one or more files or directories of the volume, read and write access to the volume is restricted. A recovery filer is then activated or designated in the cloud. A restore operation is then initiated at the recovery filter. Following completion of the restore operation, a new clean (healthy) snapshot of the volume is then created using the recovery filer For any filer other than the recovery filer, a determination is made whether the filer has completed a merge operation with respect to the new clean snapshot. If so, read and write access to the volume is re-enabled from that filer.

A cloud-native global file system in which a local filer creates objects and forward them to a cloud-based object store is augmented to include constant-time rekeying (CTR). At volume creation time on the filer, a random Intermediate Key (IK) is generated. The IK is encrypted using one or more public key(s) for the volume in question, and then stored in encrypted form in a volume metadata file (e.g., cloudvolume.xml) alongside the other volume information. Once created, the IK is treated like any other volume metadata. During startup of a volume manager on the filer, the one or more per-volume IK blobs (present) are decrypted using an appropriate secret key, and then cached in memory. All objects sent to the cloud are then symmetrically encrypted to the current IK for that volume. All objects read from the cloud are decrypted using the locally-cached IK.

A cloud-native global file system is augmented to include a file exporter (or, more generally, a file export tool) that facilitates an enterprise customer's use of a cloud-native tool that would otherwise be unable to operate against the global file system's underlying file system representation. In a typical use case, the file exporter is configured to extract in a native object format and to an unencrypted target (e.g., an S3 bucket, an Azure storage account, and the like) all or a portion of a volume's data from the underlying file system representation. In this manner, the exporter creates a copy of the data set that the enterprise user can then leverage against the desired cloud-native tool or other cloud services that are not under the management or control of the global file system service provider.