EP0369707A2 — Arrayed disk drive system and method

Claim 1

Independent Claim 169 words

An arrayed disk drive system for providing memory to a computer, said arrayed system having a plurality of disk drives configured to form an array, said arrayed disk drives accessed by a plurality of channels, each channel accessing a plurality of disk drives, and each of the arrayed disk drives having a plurality of sectors, comprising: disk controlling means for controlling the logical configuration of the arrayed disk drives to appear to the computer as any conceivable arrangement of disk drives, whereby the arrayed disk drive may appear to the computer as the plurality of disk drives, or as one large disk drive comprised of all the arrayed disk drives, or any combination in between; means for providing a plurality of levels of redundancy on data read or written by the computer to the arrayed disk drives; and means controlled by the disk controlling means for enabling from none to the plurality of levels of redundancy to operate on data being read or written from the arrayed disk drives.

Claim 2

Dependent Claim 169 words

An arrayed disk drive system for providing memory to a computer, said arrayed system having a plurality of disk drives configured to form an array, said arrayed disk drives accessed by a plurality of channels, each channel accessing a plurality of disk drives, and each of the arrayed disk drives having a plurality of sectors, comprising: disk controlling means for controlling the logical configuration of the arrayed disk drives to appear to the computer as any conceivable arrangement of disk drives, whereby the arrayed disk drive may appear to the computer as the plurality of disk drives, or as one large disk drive comprised of all the arrayed disk drives, or any combination in between; means for providing a plurality of levels of redundancy on data read or written by the computer to the arrayed disk drives; and means controlled by the disk controlling means for enabling from none to the plurality of levels of redundancy to operate on data being read or written from the arrayed disk drives.

Claim 3

Dependent Claim 87 words

The arrayed memory unit system of claim 1 having a buffer memory wherein the disk controlling means further comprises: means for allocating data received from the computer into a necessary number of blocks, said block being equal in quantity size to a sector; and striping means for striping said blocks sequentially from one channel to another, whereby said striping is horizontal across the disk drives of the arrayed disk drives, or diagonal down and across the disk drives of the arrayed disk drives, or any combination therebetween.

Claim 4

Dependent Claim 31 words

The arrayed disk drive of claim 2 wherein the striping means further comprises: means for configuring the striping means to provide horizontal or diagonal striping or any combination of striping therebetween.

Claim 5

Dependent Claim 67 words

The arrayed disk drive of claim 3 having a common data bus connecting to the plurality of channels wherein the means for providing redundancy further comprises: means for performing redundancy as the data propagates along the data bus from or to a channel during a computer read or write operation, whereby redundancy requires no more additional time than that necessary to complete the read or write operation.

Claim 6

Dependent Claim 33 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 4 wherein the controlling means further comprises: means for mapping virtual memory locations to the arrayed disk drives, said arrayed disk drives being physical memory locations.

Claim 7

Dependent Claim 46 words

The arrayed disk drive of claim 5 further comprising means for providing continuous operation of the arrayed disk drive system when a disk drive from the arrayed disk drives is removed for installing a replacement disk drive, whereby no down time is experienced by the computer.

Claim 8

Dependent Claim 37 words

The arrayed disk drive of claim 6 wherein the continuous operation providing means further comprises means for regenerating data for said removed disk drive by way of redundancy when redundancy is configured by said disk controlling means.

Claim 9

Dependent Claim 82 words

The arrayed memory unit system of claim 6 further comprises: a plurality of spare disk drives; and means for configuring said spares to be logically identical to a defective or removed disk drive, whereby a spare takes the logical place of a defective or removed disk drive such that data for the defective or removed disk drive is written to the spare disk drive, and data to be read from the defective or removed disk drive is read from the spare drive.

Claim 10

Dependent Claim 40 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 8 further comprising means for recreating the data of a defective or removed disk drive when redundancy is provided and storing that recreated data on a spare configured by said spare configuring means.

Claim 11

Dependent Claim 231 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 9 wherein the disk controlling means further comprises a plurality of process means, said plurality of process means comprising: a computer interrupt process means for servicing interrupts from and to said computer and functioning as an interface between said computer and said plurality of process means; a plurality of computer task process means for honoring read and write requests from the computer to and from the arrayed disk drives, whereby the plurality of computer task process means controls writes from the computer to the arrayed disk drives and reads from the arrayed disk drives to the computer, said plurality of computer task process means also enabling said levels of redundancy; a plurality of channel task process means for initiating the arrayed disk drives to receive write data from the plurality of computer task process means and to initiate the plurality of computer task process means to receive read data from the arrayed disk drives; a plurality of channel controlling process means for controlling the movement of data from the plurality of computer task process means to each of the plurality of channels during a read, and from each of the plurality of channels to the plurality of computer task process means during a write; and a plurality of channel interrupt process means for processing interrupts to and from each of the plurality of channels.

Claim 12

Dependent Claim 40 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 10 further comprising an operating system, said plurality of process means being connected to one another by said operating system and functioning thereon, whereby said disk controlling means operates on said operating system.

Claim 13

Dependent Claim 46 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 11, having input output parameter blocks from said computer, further comprises: means for queuing said input output parameter blocks, said queuing means operating when there are more input output parameter blocks than the plurality of computer task process means.

Claim 14

Dependent Claim 36 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 12 wherein the disk controlling means further comprises: means for providing a priority to each requests from the computer, each of said plurality of process means seeing said priority.

Claim 15

Dependent Claim 55 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 13 having a processor on which said operating system and said disk controlling means operate, said disk controlling means being comprised of high level computer software, said operating system of said high level computer software combine to made said disk controlling means retargetable on a plurality of processors.

Claim 16

Dependent Claim 47 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 14 further comprising a means for defining the location of each of the plurality of disk drives in the arrayed disk drives; and means for communicating attempts to place a disk drive in a location other than its defined location.

Claim 17

Dependent Claim 93 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 15 having a customer engineering means said arrayed disk drive system further comprising a plurality of processors, each of said plurality of channels comprising a processor, said disk controlling means comprising a processor, and said customer engineering means having a plurality of processors, wherein said disk controlling means further comprises means for providing simultaneous operation of said plurality of processors, whereby said arrayed disk system is capable of parallel processing and being configured to provide high bandwidth or high transaction rate processing or any compromise therebetween.

Claim 18

Dependent Claim 57 words

An arrayed disk drive system having a plurality of disk drives, comprising: means for configuring said plurality of disk drives into any configuration of logical memory arrangements: and means for configuring the arrayed disk system to perform from none to a plurality of levels of redundancy on data being read or written to said arrayed disk system.

Claim 19

Dependent Claim 57 words

An arrayed disk drive system having a plurality of disk drives, comprising: means for configuring said plurality of disk drives into any configuration of logical memory arrangements: and means for configuring the arrayed disk system to perform from none to a plurality of levels of redundancy on data being read or written to said arrayed disk system.

Claim 20

Dependent Claim 130 words

An arrayed disk drive system for providing memory to a computer, said arrayed system having a plurality of disk drives configured to form an array, said arrayed disk drives accessed by a plurality of channels, each channel accessing a plurality of disk drives, and each of the arrayed disk drives having a plurality of sectors, comprising: disk controlling means for configuring said plurality of disk drive to appear to the computer as any arrangement of logical disk drives, whereby the plurality of disk drives may be configured to appear all as one logical disk drive, or as a multiple of the plurality of disk drives, or any compromise configuration therebetween, said flexibility in configuration providing high bandwidth or high transaction rate processing capabilities or any compromise of processing capabilities therebetween.

Claim 21

Dependent Claim 130 words

An arrayed disk drive system for providing memory to a computer, said arrayed system having a plurality of disk drives configured to form an array, said arrayed disk drives accessed by a plurality of channels, each channel accessing a plurality of disk drives, and each of the arrayed disk drives having a plurality of sectors, comprising: disk controlling means for configuring said plurality of disk drive to appear to the computer as any arrangement of logical disk drives, whereby the plurality of disk drives may be configured to appear all as one logical disk drive, or as a multiple of the plurality of disk drives, or any compromise configuration therebetween, said flexibility in configuration providing high bandwidth or high transaction rate processing capabilities or any compromise of processing capabilities therebetween.

Claim 22

Dependent Claim 70 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 18 wherein the disk controlling means further comprises: means for providing a plurality of levels of redundancy on data read or written by the computer ot the arrayed disk drives; means controlled by the disk controlling means for enabling from none to the plurality of levels of redundancy to operate on data being read or written from the arrayed disk drives. (spare) dep.

Claim 23

Dependent Claim 231 words

The arrayed disk drive system of claim 19 wherein the disk controlling means further comprises a plurality of process means, said plurality of process mens comprising: a computer interrupt process means for servicing interrupts from and to said computer and functioning as an interface between said computer and said plurality of process means; a plurality of computer task process means for honoring read and write requests from the computer to and from the arrayed disk drives, whereby the plurality of computer task process means controls reads from the compuer to the arrayed disk drives and writes from the arrayed disk drives to the computer, said plurality of computer task process means also enabling said levels of redundancy; a plurality of channel task process means for initiating the arrayed disk drives to receive read data from the plurality of computer task process means and to initiate the plurality of computer task process means to receive write data from the arrayed disk drives; a plurality of channel controlling process means for controlling the movement of data from the plurality of computer task process means to each of the plurality of channels during a read, and from each of the plurality of channels to the plurality of computer task process means during a write; and a plurality of channel interrupt process means for processing interrupts to and from each of the plurality of channels.

Claim 24

Independent Claim 173 words

A method of arrayed disk drives for providing memory to a computer, said arrayed system having a plurality of disk drives configured to form an array, said arrayed disk drives accessed by a plurality of channels, each channel accessing a plurality of disk drives, and each of the arrayed disk drives having a plurality of sectors, comprising the steps of: providing a disk controlling means for controlling the logical configuration of the arrayed disk drives to appear to the computer as any conceivable arrangement of disk drives, whereby the arrayed disk drive may appear to the computer as the plurality of disk drives, or as one large disk drive comprised of all the arrayed disk drives, or any combination in between;[spare] providing a plurality of levels of redundancy on data read or written by the computer to the arrayed disk drives; providing means controlled by the disk controlling means for enabling from none to the plurality of levels of redundancy to operate on data being read or written from the arrayed disk drives.

Claim 25

Independent Claim 173 words

A method of arrayed disk drives for providing memory to a computer, said arrayed system having a plurality of disk drives configured to form an array, said arrayed disk drives accessed by a plurality of channels, each channel accessing a plurality of disk drives, and each of the arrayed disk drives having a plurality of sectors, comprising the steps of: providing a disk controlling means for controlling the logical configuration of the arrayed disk drives to appear to the computer as any conceivable arrangement of disk drives, whereby the arrayed disk drive may appear to the computer as the plurality of disk drives, or as one large disk drive comprised of all the arrayed disk drives, or any combination in between;[spare] providing a plurality of levels of redundancy on data read or written by the computer to the arrayed disk drives; providing means controlled by the disk controlling means for enabling from none to the plurality of levels of redundancy to operate on data being read or written from the arrayed disk drives.

Claim 26

Dependent Claim 87 words

The method of arrayed disk drives system of claim 21 having a buffer memory wherein the disk controlling means further comprises the steps of: allocating data received from the computer into a necessary number of blocks, said block being equal in quantity size to a sector; and striping said blocks sequentially from one channel to another, whereby said striping is horizontal across the disk drives of the arrayed disk drives, or diagonal down and across the disk drives of the arrayed disk drives, or any combination therebetween.

Claim 27

Dependent Claim 34 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 22 wherein the striping step further comprises the step of: configuring the striping means to provide horizontal or diagonal striping or any combination of striping therebetween.

Claim 28

Dependent Claim 70 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 23 having a common data bus connecting to the plurality of channels wherein the step for providing redundancy further comprises the step of: performing redundancy as the data propagates along the data bus from or to a channel during a computer read or write operation, whereby redundancy requires no more additional time than that necessary to complete the read or write operation.

Claim 29

Dependent Claim 35 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 24 wherein the controlling step further comprises the step of: mapping virtual memory locations to the arrayed disk drives, said arrayed disk drives being physical memory locations.

Claim 30

Dependent Claim 49 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 25 further comprising the step of providing continuous operation of the arrayed disk drive system when a disk drive from the arrayed disk drives is removed for installing a replacement disk drive, whereby no down time is experienced by the computer.

Claim 31

Dependent Claim 40 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 26 wherein the continuous operation providing step further comprises the step of regenerating data for said removed disk drive by way of redundancy when redundancy is configured by said disk controlling means.

Claim 32

Dependent Claim 85 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 26 further comprises the steps of: providing a plurality of spare disk drives; and configuring said spares to be logically identical to a defective or removed disk drive, whereby a spare takes the logical place of a defective or removed disk drive such that data for the defective or removed disk drive is written to the spare disk drive, and data to be read from the defective or removed disk drive is read from the spare drive.

Claim 33

Dependent Claim 41 words

The method of arrayed disk drive of claim 28 further comprising step of recreating the data of a defective or removed disk drive when redundancy is provided and storing that recreated data on a spare configured by said spare configuring means.

Claim 34

Dependent Claim 244 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 29 wherein the disk controlling step further comprises the step of providing a plurality of process means, said plurality of process means comprising the steps of: providing a computer interrupt process means for servicing interrupts from and to said computer and functioning as an interface between said computer and said plurality of process means; providing a plurality of computer task process means for honoring read and write requests from the computer to and from the arrayed disk drives, whereby the plurality of computer task process means controls reads from the computer to the arrayed disk drives and writes from the arrayed disk drives to the computer, said plurality of computer task process means also enabling said levels of redundancy; providing a plurality of channel task process means for initiating the arrayed disk drives to receive read data from the plurality of computer task process means and to initiate the plurality of computer task process means to receive write data from the arrayed disk drives; providing a plurality of channel controlling process means for controlling the movement of data from the plurality of computer task process means to each of the plurality of channels during a read, and from each of the plurality of channels to the plurality of computer task process means during a write; and providing a plurality of channel interrupt process means for processing interrupts to and from each of the plurality of channels.

Claim 35

Dependent Claim 45 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 30 further comprising the step of providing an operating system, said plurality of process means being connected to one another by said operating system and functioning thereon, whereby said disk controlling means operates on said operating system.

Claim 36

Dependent Claim 52 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 31, having input output parameter blocks from said computer, further comprises the steps of: providing queuing means for queuing said input output parameter blocks, said queuing means operating when there are more input output parameter blocks than the plurality of computer task process means.

Claim 37

Dependent Claim 38 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 32 wherein the disk controlling step further comprises the step of: providing a priority to each requests from the computer, each of said plurality of process means seeing said priority.

Claim 38

Dependent Claim 60 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 33 having a processor on which said operating system and said disk controlling means operate, said disk controlling step being comprised of the step of providing high level computer software, said operating system and said high level computer software combine to make said disk controlling means retargetable on a plurality of processors.

Claim 39

Dependent Claim 46 words

The method of arrayed disk drives of claim 34 further comprising the step of defining the location of each of the plurality of disk drives in the arrayed disk drives; and communicating attempts to place a disk drive in a location other than its defined location.

Claim 40

Dependent Claim 104 words

The method of arrayed disk drive of claim 35, having a customer engineering means, said arrayed disk drive system further comprising the step of providing a plurality of processors, each of said plurality of channels comprising a processor, said disk controlling means comprising a processor, and said customer engineering means having a plurality of processors, wherein said disk controlling step further comprises the step of providing simultaneous operation of said plurality of processors, whereby said method of arrayed disk drives is capable of parallel processing and being configured to provide high bandwidth processing or high transaction rate processing or any compromise processing configuration therebetween.

Arrayed disk drive system and method

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