System and method for quality of service assurance of multi-stream scenarios in a hard disk drive

1. A computer-implemented method for facilitating data placement in a storage device, the method comprising:

receiving incoming data from multiple streams, wherein the incoming data includes a plurality of data parts;

formatting the data parts by inserting a header before and a tail after each data part, wherein a formatted data part includes a respective data part, the header, and the tail, and wherein the header and the tail indicate an order and a destination zone for the respective data part within a stream;

sequentially writing the formatted data parts to a pre-allocated journal zone of a non-volatile memory of the storage device;

concatenating the data parts in the order indicated by their respective header and tail; and

sequentially writing the concatenated data parts to the non-volatile memory based on the destination zone indicated by their respective header and tail.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein prior to sequentially writing the concatenated data parts to the non-volatile memory, the method further comprises:

detecting a fault; and

reconstructing a mapping between a logical address of a data part and a physical address of the data part based on a destination zone identifier and a part length indicated by its respective header.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the received incoming data is placed in a first data buffer, and

wherein subsequent to sequentially writing the formatted data parts to the pre-allocated journal zone, the method further comprises:

reading out the formatted data parts from the pre-allocated journal zone into a second data buffer; and

validating the formatted data parts in the second data buffer.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein validating the formatted data parts in the second data buffer involves, for a respective formatted data part:

confirming that a part identifier indicated by its respective header matches a part identifier indicated by its respective tail; and

checking the respective data part based on a cyclic redundancy check value indicated by its respective tail.

5. The method of claim 1 ,

wherein the header further indicates:

a part start which is a beginning of the respective data part;

a part identifier which is a unique identifier of the respective data part;

a part length which indicates a number of bits included in the respective data part;

a destination zone identifier which is a unique identifier of a zone to which the respective data part is to be written; and

a destination zone offset which indicates a position from the part start at which to begin writing the respective data part, and

wherein the tail further indicates:

a part identifier which matches the part identifier indicated in the header;

a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) value which indicates a signature for the respective data part encoded with an existing CRC codec; and

a part end which indicates an end of the respective data part.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein in response to determining that a current write pointer is at an end of the pre-allocated journal zone, the method further comprises setting the current write pointer to a start of the pre-allocated journal zone.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

configuring a spare sector pool region of the non-volatile memory to be utilized by both a pending sector replacement and data which requires additional storage capacity due to the pre-allocated journal zone.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the storage drive includes a hard disk drive.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

allocating a zone of the non-volatile memory of the storage device as the pre-allocated journal zone.

10. A computer system for facilitating data placement, the system comprising:

a processor; and

a memory coupled to the processor and storing instructions, which when executed by the processor cause the processor to perform a method, wherein the computer system is a storage device, the method comprising:

receiving incoming data from multiple streams, wherein the incoming data includes a plurality of data parts;

formatting the data parts by inserting a header before and a tail after each data part, wherein a formatted data part includes a respective data part, the header, and the tail, and wherein the header and the tail indicate an order and a destination zone for the respective data part within a stream;

sequentially writing the formatted data parts to a pre-allocated journal zone of a non-volatile memory of the storage device;

concatenating the data parts in the order indicated by their respective header and tail; and

sequentially writing the concatenated data parts to the non-volatile memory based on the destination zone indicated by their respective header and tail.

11. The computer system of claim 10 , wherein prior to sequentially writing the concatenated data parts to the non-volatile memory, the method further comprises:

detecting a fault; and

reconstructing a mapping between a logical address of a data part and a physical address of the data part based on a destination zone identifier and a part length indicated by its respective header.

12. The computer system of claim 10 , wherein the received incoming data is placed in a first data buffer, and

wherein subsequent to sequentially writing the formatted data parts to the pre-allocated journal zone, the method further comprises:

reading out the formatted data parts from the pre-allocated journal zone into a second data buffer; and

validating the formatted data parts in the second data buffer.

13. The computer system of claim 12 , wherein validating the formatted data parts in the second data buffer involves, for a respective formatted data part:

confirming that a part identifier indicated by its respective header matches a part identifier indicated by its respective tail; and

checking the respective data part based on a cyclic redundancy check value indicated by its respective tail.

14. The computer system of claim 10 ,

wherein the header further indicates:

a part start which is a beginning of the respective data part;

a part identifier which is a unique identifier of the respective data part;

a part length which indicates a number of bits included in the respective data part;

a destination zone identifier which is a unique identifier of a zone to which the respective data part is to be written; and

a destination zone offset which indicates a position from the part start at which to begin writing the respective data part, and

wherein the tail further indicates:

a part identifier which matches the part identifier indicated in the header;

a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) value which indicates a signature for the respective data part encoded with an existing CRC codec; and

a part end which indicates an end of the respective data part.

15. The computer system of claim 10 , wherein in response to determining that a current write pointer is at an end of the pre-allocated journal zone, the method further comprises setting the current write pointer to a start of the pre-allocated journal zone.

16. The computer system of claim 10 , wherein the method further comprises:

configuring a spare sector pool region of the non-volatile memory to be utilized by both a pending sector replacement and data which requires additional storage capacity due to the pre-allocated journal zone.

17. The computer system of claim 10 , wherein the storage drive includes a hard disk drive.

18. The computer system of claim 10 , wherein the method further comprises:

allocating a zone of the non-volatile memory of the storage device as the pre-allocated journal zone.

19. An apparatus for facilitating data placement, the apparatus comprising:

a communication unit configured to receive incoming data from multiple streams, wherein the incoming data includes a plurality of data parts;

a data-formatting unit configured to format the data parts by inserting a header before and a tail after each data part, wherein a formatted data part includes a respective data part, the header, and the tail, and wherein the header and the tail indicate an order and a destination zone for the respective data part within a stream;

a journal zone-managing unit configured to sequentially write the formatted data parts to a pre-allocated journal zone of a non-volatile memory of the storage device;

a data-concatenating unit configured to concatenate the data parts in the order indicated by their respective header and tail; and

a data-writing unit configured to sequentially write the concatenated data parts to the non-volatile memory based on the destination zone indicated by their respective header and tail.

20. The apparatus of claim 19 , wherein the journal zone-managing unit is further configured to allocate a zone of the non-volatile memory of the storage device as the pre-allocated journal zone, and wherein the apparatus further comprises:

a fault-managing unit configured to:

detect a fault; and

reconstruct a mapping between a logical address of a data part and a physical address of the data part based on a destination zone identifier and a part length indicated by its respective header; and

a data-validating unit configured to:

read out the formatted data parts from the pre-allocated journal zone into a second data buffer; and

validate the formatted data parts in the second data buffer.