Granted Patent B2

US 6,950,833 · App. 10/162,258 · Granted Sep 27, 2005

Abstract

Claims (38)

1. A method of maintaining mirror consistency of data volumes in a cluster of computer system nodes sharing direct read/write access to storage devices via a storage area network, comprising:

automatically ensuring replication of a mirror leg in response to detection that a failed process was writing to a mirrored data volume;

accepting access requests to the mirrored data volume while reading data from an intact mirror leg and writing the data back to the mirrored data volume; and

processing the access requests that do not interfere with the creation of a replacement mirror leg while postponing processing of interfering access requests until there is no interference.

2. A method as recited in claim 1 , wherein said ensuring includes placing the interior mirror in writeback mode to automatically write all legs of the interior mirror when the interior mirror is read.

3. A method as recited in claim 1 , wherein the failed process is performed on a mirror master, and

wherein said ensuring includes selecting a new mirror master to coordinate mirror input/output requests and replicate all of the mirrored data volume.

4. A method of maintaining mirror consistency of data volumes in a cluster of computer system nodes sharing direct read/write access to storage devices via a storage area network, comprising:

automatically ensuring replication of a mirror leg in response to detection that a failed process was writing to a mirrored data volume, by

detecting failure of at least process accessing the mirrored data volume;

detecting and aborting any outstanding input/output operations requested by the at least one process; and

initiating a mirror revive process if a write operation from the at least one process to a mirrored volume is detected;

accepting access requests to the mirrored data volume while reading data from an intact mirror leg and writing the data back to the mirrored data volume; and

processing the access requests that do not interfere with the creation of a replacement mirror leg while postponing processing of interfering access requests until there is no interference.

5. A method as recited in claim 4 ,

wherein the mirror revive process comprises

holding input/output requests from the computer system nodes made during the mirror revive process in an overlap queue;

reading from a first range of addresses on an intact leg of the mirrored data volume and writing to first range of addresses on all legs of the mirrored data volume after ensuring that all input/output activity to the first range of addresses is complete; and

repeating said reading and writing for additional ranges of addresses, until all legs of the mirrored data volume are consistent, and

wherein said processing the access requests includes processing the input/output requests in the overlap queue that are outside the first range of addresses during said read and writing to the first range of addresses.

6. A method as recited in claim 5 , further comprising:

detecting failure of a storage device storing at least part of a leg of the mirrored data volume;

replicating the leg of the mirrored data volume using the mirror revive process.

7. A cluster of computer systems, comprising:

storage devices storing at least one mirrored data volume with at least two mirror legs;

a storage area network coupled to said storage devices; and

computer system nodes, coupled to said storage area network, sharing direct read/write access to said storage devices, maintaining mirror consistency during normal operation and replicating a mirror leg upon detecting failure of a first one of said computer system nodes that was writing to the at least one mirrored data volume, while continuing to accept access requests to the at least one mirrored data volume from remaining ones of said computer system nodes.

8. A cluster of computer systems as recited in claim 1 , wherein a second one of said computer system nodes detects the failure of the first one of said computer nodes accessing the at least one mirrored data volume and then detects and aborts any outstanding input/output operations requested by the first one of said computer nodes and initiates a mirror revive process if a write operation from the first one of said computer nodes to a mirrored volume is detected.

9. A cluster of computer systems as recited in claim 1 , wherein the at least one mirrored data volume includes an interior mirror and

wherein the replicating of the mirror leg includes placing the interior mirror in writeback mode to automatically write all legs of the interior mirror when the interior mirror is read.

10. A cluster of computer systems as recited in claim 1 , wherein the first one of said computer system nodes is a mirror master and the replicating is controlled by a second one of said computer system nodes selected as a new mirror master to coordinate mirror input/output requests and replicate all of the mirrored data volume.

11. At least one computer readable medium storing at least one program embodying a method of maintaining mirror consistency of data volumes in a cluster of computer systems sharing direct read/write access to storage devices via a storage area network, said method comprising:

automatically ensuring replication of a mirror leg in response to detection that a failed process was writing to a mirrored data volume;

accepting access requests to the mirrored data volume while reading data from an intact mirror leg and writing the data back to the mirrored data volume; and

processing the access requests that do not interfere with the creation of a replacement mirror leg while postponing processing of interfering access requests until there is no interference.

12. At least one computer readable medium as recited in claim 11 , wherein said ensuring includes placing the interior mirror in writeback mode to automatically write all legs of the interior mirror when the interior mirror is read.

13. At least one computer readable medium as recited in claim 11 , wherein the failed process is performed on a mirror master, and

wherein said ensuring includes selecting a new mirror master to coordinate mirror input/output requests and replicate all of the mirrored data volume.

Assignments (12)