SAN Configuration History Tracking via Database Segmentation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional database tracking mechanisms in information networks, such as storage area networks (SANs), face inefficiencies due to the accumulation of large history trails that require computationally expensive I/O operations, as they typically duplicate current and historical entries, leading to redundant data storage and parsing.
Innovation Solution
The system maintains configuration history entries in both current and historical logs, avoiding redundant storage by storing each configuration change only in one set, using a database manager that aggregates information in real-time and employs a trigger processor to propagate changes, ensuring consistency and accuracy without duplicative operations.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If conventional database tracking mechanisms store both current and historical configuration entries in the same database tables, then complete configuration history is maintained, but computationally expensive I/O operations and redundant data storage occur
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the database into separate tables: a current configuration table storing only active configuration data, and a historical configuration table storing archived configuration data. This segmentation eliminates the need to parse through extensive historical entries when accessing current configuration, thereby reducing computationally expensive I/O operations while preserving complete configuration history across both tables.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent extracts historical configuration entries from the main current configuration table and stores them in a separate historical configuration table. This extraction removes redundant data from the active configuration storage, allowing the system to maintain complete configuration history while improving I/O efficiency by preventing redundant reads of historical data during current configuration operations.
2Loss of information
If conventional mechanisms duplicate current entries in history files, then complete configuration history is maintained, but redundant data storage and parsing requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts superseded configuration entries from the current configuration table and stores them in a separate historical configuration table. This extraction eliminates duplication by ensuring that each configuration entry exists in only one table at a time - either in the current table (if active) or in the historical table (if superseded), thereby reducing redundant data storage while maintaining complete configuration history.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements a mechanism where configuration entries are discarded from the current configuration table once they are superseded, and simultaneously recovered and stored in the historical configuration table. This discard-and-recover process prevents redundant storage of the same configuration data in both tables simultaneously, reducing overall data storage requirements while preserving the complete configuration history for audit and recovery purposes.
Data Source
AI summary
A SAN management application maintains configuration information in a near real-time (RT) manner for timely and accurate responses to queries. A database manager responsive to the management application aggregates information concerning both current and historical configurations by combining current and historical information sets as a common (DB) database portal responsive to an individual query for configuration data from both current and historical data. The common portal avoids redundant and duplicative entries between the current and historical information sets, and is responsive to the management application for maintaining each change on only one of the current and historical information sets. Configuration changes add, update and move data items between the current and historical information sets, but need not store a configuration change in both the current and history information sets.