Method, electronic device and computer-readable medium for managing metadata

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11216427-B2
Application number	US-201916456985-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 28, 2019
Priority date	Jan 29, 2019
Publication date	Jan 4, 2022
Grant date	Jan 4, 2022

Abstract

Embodiments of the present disclosure provide a method, an electronic device and a computer-readable medium for managing metadata. The method disclosed herein comprises: obtaining a check marker from a remote device; determining whether the check marker indicates that user data and metadata have been backed up in the remote device, the user data and the metadata being generated by an operation executed by a user on an object; and in response to the check marker indicating that the user data and the metadata have been backed up in the remote device, marking the metadata as removable metadata. In this way, the embodiments of the present disclosure can improve garbage collection efficiency of a storage system and execution efficiency of a metadata integration task.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method, comprising:
in response to performing metadata integration of first metadata and second metadata to transform the second metadata into updated metadata, delaying, by a system comprising a processor, marking the first metadata as removable until the updated metadata is backed up;
obtaining, by a system comprising a processor, a check marker from a remote device;
determining whether the check marker indicates that user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device, the user data and the updated metadata being generated based on an operation executed on an object; and
in response to the check marker indicating that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device:
marking the first metadata as removable, and
performing garbage collection on the first metadata.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determining whether the check marker indicates that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device comprises:
obtaining, from the updated metadata, an indication of a location of log information in a log, the log information being associated with the operation;
determining whether a location indicated by the check marker is the location of the log information or another location subsequent to the location of the log information; and
in response to the location indicated by the check marker being the location of the log information or the other location subsequent to the location of the log information, determining that the check marker indicates that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining whether the operation is an update operation on the object.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the determining whether the operation is the update operation on the object comprises:
determining whether the operation is at least one of a modification, a rewriting, or a deletion of the object.

5. The method of claim 3 , further comprising:
in response to the operation being the update operation on the object, creating the metadata integration task.

6. The method of claim 5 , further comprising:
determining a priority of executing the metadata integration task according to an order of the location of the log information in the log.

7. A device comprising:
a processor; and
a memory storing computer program instructions, the processor executing the computer program instructions in the memory to control the device to perform operations comprising:
in response to performing metadata integration of first metadata and second metadata that comprises transforming the second metadata into updated metadata, delaying marking the first metadata as the removable metadata until the updated metadata is backed up;
obtaining a check marker from a remote device;
determining whether the check marker indicates that user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device, the user data and the updated metadata being generated based on an operation executed on an object; and
in response to the check marker indicating that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device:
marking the first metadata as removable, and
performing garbage collection on the first metadata.

8. The device of claim 7 , wherein the determining whether the check marker indicates that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device comprises:
obtaining, from the updated metadata, an indication of a location of log information in a log, the log information being associated with the operation;
determining whether a location indicated by the check marker is the location of the log information or another location subsequent to the location of the log information; and
in response to the location indicated by the check marker being the location of the log information or the other location subsequent to the location of the log information, determining that the check marker indicates that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device.

9. The device of claim 7 , the operations further comprising:
determining whether the operation is an update operation on the object; and
in response to the operation being the update operation on the object, creating the metadata integration task.

10. The device of claim 9 , wherein the determining whether the operation is the update operation on the object comprises:
determining whether the operation is a modification operation.

11. The device of claim 9 , wherein the determining whether the operation is the update operation on the object comprises:
determining whether the operation is a deletion of the object.

12. The device of claim 9 , wherein the determining whether the operation is the update operation on the object comprises:
determining whether the operation is a rewriting operation, or deletion of the object.

13. The device of claim 8 , the operations further comprising:
determining a priority of executing the metadata integration task according to an order of the location of the log information in the log.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising computer programs stored thereon, the computer program when executed by a processor causing the processor to perform operations, comprising:
as part of performing metadata integration of first metadata and second metadata that comprises transforming the second metadata into updated metadata, delaying marking the first metadata as the removable metadata until the updated metadata is backed up;
obtaining a check marker from a remote device;
determining whether the check marker indicates that user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device, the user data and the updated metadata being generated based on an operation executed on an object; and
in response to the check marker indicating that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device:
marking the first metadata as removable, and
performing garbage collection on the first metadata.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 14 , wherein the determining whether the check marker indicates that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device comprises:
obtaining, from the updated metadata, an indication of a location of log information in a log, the log information being associated with the operation;
determining whether a location indicated by the check marker is the location of the log information or another location subsequent to the location of the log information; and
in response to the location indicated by the check marker being the location of the log information or the other location subsequent to the location of the log information, determining that the check marker indicates that the user data and the updated metadata have been backed up in the remote device.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 14 , the operations further comprising:
determining whether the operation is an update operation on the object; and
in response to the operation being the update operation on the object, creating the metadata integration task.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16 , wherein the determining whether the operation is the update operation on the object comprises:
determining whether the operation is a modification operation.

18. The non-transitory computer-r

Assignees

• Emc Ip Holding Co Llc

Inventors

• Zhang Alex Pengbo
• Chen Xiao

Classifications

• G06F16/289

  Object oriented databases · CPC title

• G06F3/0652 Primary

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

• G06F3/067

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

• G06F16/2379

  Updates performed during online database operations; commit processing · CPC title

• G06F16/215 Primary

  Improving data quality; Data cleansing, e.g. de-duplication, removing invalid entries or correcting typographical errors · CPC title