EMC Assigned Six Patents

Determining logical data objects corresponding to physical storage locations
EMC Corp., Hopkinton, MA, has been assigned a patent (8,832,163) developed by six co-inventors for “techniques for determining logical data objects corresponding to physical storage locations.”

The co-inventors are Terry Seto Lee, Arcadia, CA, Mei Ren, Duluth, GA, Neil J. O’Brien, Groton, MA, Narasimha Mandyam Krishnakumar, Natick, MA, Yiwen Huang, Wayland, MA, and Philip E. Tamer, Westborough, MA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “Described are techniques for determining one or more logical data objects for a storage location. The storage location indicating a location on a device of a storage system is provided. A list of one or more logical data objects is received. For each of the one or more logical data objects, one or more related storage system locations associated with each logical data object are determined. It is determined whether the storage location is included in any of the one or more logical data objects. It is also identified whether, for each of the one or more logical data objects, the storage location is one of the one or more related storage system locations associated with each logical data object.”

The patent application was filed on Sept. 14, 2007 (11/901,213).

Shared storage access load balancing for large number of hosts
EMC, Hopkinton, MA, has been assigned a patent (8,819,344) developed by five co-inventors for “shared storage access load balancing for a large number of hosts.”

The co-inventors are Per Brashers, Oakland, CA, Sorin Faibish, Jason Glasgow, Newton, MA, Xiaoye Jiang, Shrewsbury, MA, and James Pedone, West Boylston, MA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A data processing system includes host data processors, a storage system including storage shared among the host data processors, and a data switch coupling the host data processors to the storage system. The storage system has host adapter ports coupled to the data switch. The data switch is programmed for distributing block I/O requests from the host data processors over the operable host adapter ports for load balancing of the block I/O requests among the operable host adapter ports. The shared storage can be a file system striped across RAID sets of disk drives for load balancing upon disk director ports of the storage system. The data processing system can be expanded by adding more storage systems, switches for the additional storage systems, and switches for routing block I/O requests from the host processors to the storage systems.”

The patent application was filed on Aug. 9, 2007 (11/836,735).

Dynamic data structures
EMC, Hopkinton, MA, has been assigned a patent (8,819,077) developed by two co-inventors for “dynamic data structures.”

The co-inventors are Jeroen van Rotterdam, Berkeley, CA, and Mark Polman, Rotterdam, Netherlands.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A method, article of manufacture, and apparatus for managing a cloud computing environment. In some embodiments, this includes instantiating an object, modifying a trait of the object at runtime, storing the modified object in a storage device. In some embodiments, the object may include required traits. In some embodiments, modifying a trait includes adding a trait.”

The patent application was filed on June 30, 2011 (13/174,740).

Transfer between storage devices
EMC, Hopkinton, MA, has been assigned a patent (8,832,325) developed by three co-inventors for “transfer between storage devices.“

The co-inventors are Subin George, Framingham, MA, Michael J. Scharland, Franklin, MA, and Arieh Don, Newton, MA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “Migrating data from a source storage device to a target storage device includes creating new paths to the target storage device, setting the target storage device to a state where I/O operations are initially accepted, where accepted I/O operations are rejected some time after acceptance, setting the source storage device to a state where at least some I/O operations are rejected, transferring metadata corresponding to the source storage device to the target storage device, where state information is transferred from the source storage device to the target storage device and setting the target storage device to a state where I/O operations are accepted and performed. Migrating data from a source storage device to a target storage device may also include creating new volumes on the target storage device and transferring data from the source storage device to the target storage device.”

The patent application was filed on June 28, 2012 (13/536,424).

Service level mapping method
EMC, Hopkinton, MA, has been assigned a patent (8,832,246) developed by five co-inventors for “a method and system for assigning service level objectives to data objects stored within a computer system.”

The co-inventors are Manoj Nair, Cary, NC, Stephen R. Perrin, Chapel Hill, NC, Iva Blazina Vukelja, Everett, MA, John Philip Bell II, Skibbereen, Ireland, and Alex Rankov, Danville, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A method and system for assigning service level objectives to data objects stored within a computer system. The computer system includes an information management server for providing customized services to data objects residing in the computer system. One exemplary method identifies a data object, such as a file, folder, database, and the like, that has been categorized according to at least one property associated with the data object. The method also identifies service level objectives that are available within the computer system. Service level objectives may include any type of service area or service level that can be provided to a data object. The data object is then associated with one or more of the service level objectives for requesting that the services associated with the one or more service level objectives be provided to the data object.”

The patent application was filed on Sept. 27, 2006 (11/528,790).

Supplying storage services
EMC, Hopkinton, MA, has been assigned a patent (8,819,234) developed by three co-inventors for “supplying storage services.“

The co-inventors are Andreas L. Bauer, Boxborough, MA, Stephen J. Todd, Shrewsbury, MA, and Douglas A. Wood, Westford, MA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A method is used in supplying storage services. For a set of applications running on an electronic system, an application service is provided to each application in the set to support operation of that application. The application service is separate from OS services and security protection services provided by the electronic system. A storage service provider being separate from the electronic system is communicated with to use resources of the storage service provider in providing the application service to each application in the set.“

The patent application was filed on Sept. 28, 2007 (11/904,880).