Techniques using multiple service level objectives in connection with a storage group

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9965218-B1
Application number	US-201514870336-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Sep 30, 2015
Priority date	Sep 30, 2015
Publication date	May 8, 2018
Grant date	May 8, 2018

Abstract

Described are techniques for processing service level objectives. A first service level objective specified for a storage group of devices may include a first value denoting a first target level of performance for I/O operations. A second service level objective specified for a first portion of the storage group may include a second value denoting a second target level of performance for I/O operations directed to the first portion. The second value may denote a higher level of performance than the first value. It may be determined whether there is a violation of any of the first service level objective and the second level objective. Responsive to determining there is the violation of any of the first service level objective and the second level objective, one or more data movements in accordance with the violation may be performed.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of processing service level objectives comprising:
specifying, using a processor, a first service level objective for a storage group of one or more devices, said first service level objective including a first value denoting a first target level of performance for I/O (Input/Output) operations directed to the storage group;
specifying, using a processor, a second service level objective for a first portion of the storage group, said second service level objective including a second value denoting a second target level of performance for I/O operations directed to the first portion of the storage group, said second value denoting a higher level of performance than the first value; and
enforcing the first service level objective and the second service level objective during a same time period, said enforcing including:
applying the second service level objective to the first portion and applying the first service level objective to all data portions of the storage group, wherein both the first service level objective and the second service level objective are applied to the first portion;
determining, using a processor, whether there is a violation of any of the first service level objective for the storage group and the second service level objective for the first portion of the storage group, wherein a first I/O workload of the first portion is included in a first observed performance value for the storage group used in determining whether there is a violation of the first service level objective, and the first I/O workload of the first portion is also included in a second observed performance value for the first portion used in determining whether there is a violation of the second service level objective; and
responsive to determining there is the violation of any of the first service level objective and the second level objective, performing one or more data movements using a processor, wherein the one or more data movements facilitate any of alleviation or removal of the violation determined, at least a first of the one or more data movements moving data from a source storage tier to a target storage tier that has higher performance than the source storage tier.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein a hint includes the second service level objective, identifies the first portion, and denotes any of a date, day, time and time period at which the second service level objective is applied to the first portion of the storage group.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the first portion includes a portion of a logical address space of a first device in the storage group.

4. The method of claim 2 , wherein said determining whether there is a violation includes performing first processing to determine whether there is a violation of the first service level objective with respect to the storage group, said first processing comprising:
determining the first observed performance value for the storage group; and
determining whether the first observed performance value violates the first service level objective.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein said determining whether there is a violation includes performing second processing to determine whether there is a violation of the second service level objective with respect to the first portion of the storage group, said second processing including:
determining the second observed performance value for the first portion of the storage group; and
determining whether the second observed performance value violates the second service level objective.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the first portion identified in the hint includes a first subrange of a first logical address space of a first device of the storage group and includes a second subrange of a second logical address space of a second device.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the first observed performance value is determined with respect to a second I/O workload directed to the one or more devices of the storage group and wherein the second observed performance value is determined with respect to the first I/O workload directed to the first portion of the storage group, said first I/O workload being included in the second I/O workload.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first value is a first average response time for an I/O operation and the second value is a second average response time for an I/O operation.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein each of the one or more devices of the storage group is a different logical device.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein each of the one or more devices of the storage group is a virtually provisioned device.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the storage group of one or more devices has storage provisioned from a plurality of storage tiers, each of the plurality of storage tiers including physical storage devices having different performance characteristics.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein said plurality of storage tiers have an expected relative performance ranking from a first of the plurality of storage tiers having a highest performance ranking to a second of the plurality of storage tiers having a lowest performance ranking.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first portion denotes a logical address space that is less than an entire address space for the storage group.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first portion denotes an entire address space for the storage group.

15. A system comprising:
a processor; and
a memory comprising code stored therein that, when executed, performs a method of processing service level objectives comprising:
specifying, using a processor, a first service level objective for a storage group of one or more devices, said first service level objective including a first value denoting a first target level of performance for I/O (Input/Output) operations directed to the storage group;
specifying, using a processor, a second service level objective for a first portion of the storage group, said second service level objective including a second value denoting a second target level of performance for I/O operations directed to the first portion of the storage group, said second value denoting a higher level of performance than the first value; and
enforcing the first service level objective and the second service level objective during a same time period, said enforcing including:
applying the second service level objective to the first portion and applying the first service level objective to all data portions of the storage group, wherein both the first service level objective and the second service level objective are applied to the first portion;
determining, using a processor, whether there is a violation of any of the first service level objective for the storage group and the second service level objective for the first portion of the storage group, wherein a first I/O workload of the first portion is included in a first observed performance value for the storage group used in determining whether there is a violation of the first service level objective, and the first I/O workload of the first portion is also included in a second observed performance value for the first portion used in determining whether there is a violation of the second service level objective; and
responsive to determining there is the violation of any of the first service level objective and the second level objective, performing one or more data movements using a processor, wherein the one or more data movements facilitate any of alleviation or removal of the violation determined, at least a first of the one or more dat

Assignees

• Emc Ip Holding Co Llc

Inventors

• Martin Owen
• Alshawabkeh Malak
• Wang Hui
• Liu Xiaomei
• Dolan Sean C
• Sahin Adnan

Classifications

• G06F3/0649

  Lifecycle management · CPC title

• G06F3/0689

  Disk arrays, e.g. RAID, JBOD · CPC title

• G06F3/0611 Primary

  in relation to response time · CPC title

• G06F3/0653 Primary

  Monitoring storage devices or systems · CPC title

• G06F3/0619

  in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors · CPC title