Online cluster expansion for storage system with decoupled logical and physical capacity

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10747474-B2
Application number	US-201816166637-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 22, 2018
Priority date	Oct 22, 2018
Publication date	Aug 18, 2020
Grant date	Aug 18, 2020

Abstract

An apparatus in one embodiment comprises at least one processing device comprising a processor coupled to a memory. The processing device is configured, in conjunction with an online cluster expansion process for a clustered storage system having an address space distributed across a set of storage controllers each associated with one or more storage devices, to modify the distribution of the address space across the set of storage controllers responsive to adding at least one of compute and storage capacity to the set of storage controllers of the clustered storage system. The processing device is also configured to identify a set of pending input-output requests directed to deletion of data in the clustered storage system, and to execute the set of pending input-output requests prior to relocating data in the clustered storage system based at least in part on the modified distribution of the address space.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus comprising:
at least one processing device comprising a processor coupled to a memory;
the at least one processing device being configured, in conjunction with an online cluster expansion process for a clustered storage system having an address space distributed across a set of storage controllers each associated with one or more storage devices:
to modify the distribution of the address space across the set of storage controllers responsive to adding at least one of compute and storage capacity to the set of storage controllers of the clustered storage system;
to identify a set of pending input-output requests directed to deletion of data in the clustered storage system;
to execute the set of pending input-output requests directed to deletion of data in the clustered storage system prior to relocating data in the clustered storage system based at least in part on the modified distribution of the address space;
to receive, at a given one of the set of storage controllers, a given input-output request directed to data associated with a given content-based signature that is in a given portion of the address space allocated to the given storage controller in the modified distribution of the address space; and
to modify a manner in which the given input-output request is processed at the given storage controller based at least in part on whether the given content-based signature was in a portion of the address space allocated to the given storage controller prior to the modification of the distribution of the address space.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the storage devices associated with the set of storage controllers of the clustered storage system are configured to store user data pages and metadata pages, each of the user data pages having a logical address and a content-based signature derived from content of that user data page, each of the metadata pages characterizing a plurality of the user data pages and associating the content-based signatures of those user data pages with respective physical blocks in the storage devices.

3. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein the address space is distributed across the set of storage controllers of the clustered storage system by allocating slices of the address space across the set of storage controllers of the clustered storage system, each slice comprising a set of the content-based signatures.

4. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the set of storage controllers are configured to decouple release of logical addresses from release of the physical blocks corresponding to the logical addresses, wherein decoupling release of the logical addresses from release of the physical blocks corresponding to the logical addresses comprises at least one of (i) releasing the logical addresses in a different order than the physical blocks corresponding to the logical addresses and (ii) releasing the logical addresses at different times than the physical blocks corresponding to the logical addresses.

5. The apparatus of claim 4 wherein identifying the set of pending input-output requests directed to deletion of data in the clustered storage system comprises identifying pending dereferencing operations for respective ones of the physical blocks corresponding to released logical addresses.

6. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured to relocate data in the clustered storage system based at least in part on the modified distribution of the address space.

7. The apparatus of claim 6 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured, for a given portion of data on a first storage device associated with a first one of the set of storage controllers that is part of a first portion of the address space relocated from the first storage device associated with the first storage controller to a second storage device associated with the first storage controller or a second one of the set of storage controllers, to remove the given portion of the data from the first storage device.

8. The apparatus of claim 6 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured to determine if the given content-based signature was in a portion of the address space allocated to the given storage controller prior to the modification of the distribution of the address space.

9. The apparatus of claim 8 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured to update metadata associating the content-based signature with one or more physical blocks in one or more of the storage devices associated with the given storage controller in accordance with the given input-output request responsive to determining that the given content-based signature was in the portion of the address space allocated to the given storage controller prior to the modification of the distribution of the address space.

10. The apparatus of claim 8 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured to determine if the data associated with the given content-based signature has already been relocated from one or more storage devices associated with another one of the set of storage controllers to one or more of the storage devices associated with the given storage controller responsive to determining that the given content-based signature was not in the portion of the address space allocated to the given storage controller prior to the modification of the distribution of the address space.

11. The apparatus of claim 10 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured to update metadata associating the content-based signature with one or more physical blocks in one or more of the storage devices associated with the given storage controller in accordance with the given input-output request responsive to determining that the data associated with the given content-based signature has already been relocated to the storage devices associated with the given storage controller.

12. The apparatus of claim 10 wherein the at least one processing device is further configured to send a request to the other storage controller to update metadata associating the content-based signature with one or more physical blocks in the storage devices associated with the other storage controller in accordance with the given input-output request responsive to determining that the data associated with the given content-based signature has not already been relocated to the storage devices associated with the given storage controller.

13. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the processing device is implemented in one of:
a host device configured to communicate over a network with at least one storage system that comprises at least one of the set of storage controllers; and
at least one of the set of storage controllers.

14. A method comprising:
in conjunction with an online cluster expansion process for a clustered storage system having an address space distributed across a set of storage controllers each associated with one or more storage devices, modifying the distribution of the address space across the set of storage controllers responsive to adding at least one of compute and storage capacity to the set of storage controllers of the clustered storage system;
identifying a set of pending input-output requests directed to deletion of data in the clustered storage system;
executing the set of pending input-output requests directed to deletion of data in the clustered storage system prior to relocating data in the clustered storage system based at least in part on the modified distribution of the address space;
receiving, at a given one of the set of

Assignees

• Emc Ip Holding Co Llc

Inventors

• Schneider Zvi
• Shabi Uri
• Rahamim Maor

Classifications

• G06F3/067 Primary

  Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS] · CPC title

• G06F3/0662

  Virtualisation aspects · CPC title

• G06F3/065

  Replication mechanisms · CPC title

• G06F3/0652

  Erasing, e.g. deleting, data cleaning, moving of data to a wastebasket · CPC title

• G06F3/0607

  by facilitating the process of upgrading existing storage systems, e.g. for improving compatibility between host and storage device · CPC title