Automatic failover of a storage manager

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2022261321-A1
Application number	US-202117175259-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Feb 12, 2021
Priority date	Feb 12, 2021
Publication date	Aug 18, 2022
Grant date	—

Abstract

An information management system implements a method for determining whether to initiate a failover of a storage manager in the system. Nodes in the system may be assigned as monitoring nodes configured to communicate with a storage manager. Furthermore, each monitoring node may be configured to transmit a status inquiry message to each other monitoring node, and each monitoring node may receive a status inquiry message from each other monitoring node. Each monitoring node may also generate a session message comprising status information, and a plurality of failover nodes may receive the generated session messages. A failover node may then determine whether a failover condition has occurred by applying a plurality of failover rules to the status information of the transmitted session message. Where the failover node determines that a failover condition has occurred, the failover node may activate an offline storage manager to replace the active storage manager.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method for determining whether to initiate a failover of a storage manager in an information management system, the method comprising:
assigning selected nodes of a plurality of nodes in an information management system as monitoring nodes to obtain a plurality of monitoring nodes, wherein:
the plurality of nodes is configured to communicate with a first storage manager of the information management system, and
each monitoring node is configured to transmit a status message to each other monitoring node;
receiving, at a monitoring node, a plurality of status messages, wherein each status message was transmitted by another monitoring node of the assigned plurality of monitoring nodes; generating, at the monitoring node, a session message comprising status information for each monitoring node of the assigned plurality of monitoring nodes, wherein the status information is obtained from the received plurality of status messages; transmitting the session message to a plurality of failover nodes; determining, by at least one failover node of the plurality of failover nodes, whether a failover condition has occurred by applying a plurality of failover rules to the status information of the transmitted session message; activating a failover node selected from the plurality of failover nodes to be a second storage manager based on a determination that the failover condition has occurred; and instructing, by the activated second storage manager, that the plurality of monitoring nodes is to communicate with the activated second storage manager instead of the first storage manager, wherein the activated second storage manager performs the functionalities of the first storage manager in the information management system.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the monitoring node instantiates a session handler configured to:
process the received plurality of status messages, and update a time and status for each monitoring node associated with a corresponding status message of the plurality of status messages.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the status information comprises time and status for each monitoring node of the assigned plurality of monitoring nodes.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the monitoring node instantiates a periodic thread to transmit the session message, wherein the periodic thread is configured to transmit the session message at predetermined time intervals.

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:
each failover node is associated with a corresponding database, wherein the corresponding database is a backup of a database in communication with the first storage manager, and the method further comprises selecting the at least one failover node to activate based on which database of the corresponding databases is the most recent backup of the database in communication with the storage manager relative to the other corresponding databases.

6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the method further comprises:
verifying that the failover condition has occurred by requesting that each failover node of the plurality of failover nodes confirm that the failover condition has occurred.

7 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
sending a configuration file to each selected node of the plurality of nodes that have been selected to be monitoring nodes; and, automatically configuring each of the selected nodes to be a monitoring node based on the sent configuration file.

8 . A system that determines whether to initiate a failover of a storage manager in an information management system, the system comprising:
one or more non-transitory, computer-readable mediums having computer-executable instructions stored thereon; and, one or more processors that, having executed the computer-executable instructions, configure the system to perform a plurality of operations comprising:
assigning selected nodes of a plurality of nodes in an information management system as monitoring nodes to obtain a plurality of monitoring nodes, wherein:
the plurality of nodes is configured to communicate with a first storage manager of the information management system, and
each monitoring node is configured to transmit a status message to each other monitoring node;

receiving, at a monitoring node, a plurality of status messages, wherein each status message was transmitted by another monitoring node of the assigned plurality of monitoring nodes;
generating, at the monitoring node, a session message comprising status information for each monitoring node of the assigned plurality of monitoring nodes, wherein the status information is obtained from the received plurality of status messages;
transmitting the session message to a plurality of failover nodes;
determining, by at least one failover node of the plurality of failover nodes, whether a failover condition has occurred by applying a plurality of failover rules to the status information of the transmitted session message;
activating a failover node selected from the plurality of failover nodes to be a second storage manager based on a determination that the failover condition has occurred; and
instructing, by the activated second storage manager, that the plurality of monitoring nodes is to communicate with the activated second storage manager instead of the first storage manager, wherein the activated second storage manager performs the functionalities of the first storage manager in the information management system.

9 . The system of claim 8 , wherein the monitoring node instantiates a session handler configured to:
process the received plurality of status messages, and update a time and status for each monitoring node associated with a corresponding status message of the plurality of status messages.

10 . The system of claim 9 , wherein the status information comprises time and status for each monitoring node of the assigned plurality of monitoring nodes.

11 . The system of claim 8 , wherein the monitoring node instantiates a periodic thread to transmit the session message, wherein the periodic thread is configured to transmit the session message at predetermined time intervals.

12 . The system of claim 8 , wherein:
each failover node is associated with a corresponding database, wherein the corresponding database is a backup of a database in communication with the first storage manager, and the plurality of operations further comprises selecting the at least one failover node to activate based on which database of the corresponding databases is the most recent backup of the database in communication with the storage manager relative to the other corresponding databases.

13 . The system of claim 8 , wherein the plurality of operations further comprises:
verifying that the failover condition has occurred by requesting that each failover node of the plurality of failover nodes confirm that the failover condition has occurred.

14 . The system of claim 8 , wherein the plurality of operations further comprises:
sending a configuration file to each selected node of the plurality of nodes that have been selected to be monitoring nodes; and, automatically configuring each of the selected nodes to be a monitoring node based on the sent configuration file.

15 . A non-transitory, computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform a plurality of operations determining whether to initiate a failover of a storage manager in an information management system, the plurality of operations

Assignees

• Commvault Systems Inc

Inventors

• Zakharkin Dmitriy Borisovich
• PRADHAN Manoj Kumar
• Vijayan Manoj Kumar

Classifications

• G06F11/1451

  by selection of backup contents · CPC title

• G06F11/2092 Primary

  Techniques of failing over between control units · CPC title

• G06F2201/82

  Solving problems relating to consistency · CPC title