NetApp Assigned Eight Patents

Aliasing of exported paths in storage system
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,762,434) developed by Thomas D. Haynes, Tulsa, OK, Mark Muhlestein, Tucson, AZ, and David B. Noveck, Lexington, MA, for “aliasing of exported paths in a storage system.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A storage system, such as a file server, uses pathname aliasing and exports a stored resource to clients by advertising to the clients a different pathname than the actual pathname of the resource.“

The patent application was filed on Oct. 8, 2010 (12/901,276).

Specifying batch execution ordering of requests in storage system cluster
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,762,416) developed by Peter F. Corbett, Lexington, MA, for a “system and method for specifying batch execution ordering of requests in a storage system cluster.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A method for operating a computer data storage system is described. A plurality of requests are received from a client, each request of the plurality of requests having assigned a unique sequence number, each request being an input/output request to a data storage device. The plurality of requests is divided into a plurality of subsets of requests. A unique batch number is assigned to each subset of requests so that each subset of requests is assigned a unique batch number. A first subset of requests having a first batch number is executed in arbitrary order with respect to the sequence number of each request. A second subset of requests is executed in response to a second batch number after execution of all of the first subset of requests has completed.”

The patent application was filed on Dec. 15, 2009 (12/637,926).

Testing multi-protocol storage systems
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,788,685) developed by John R. Boyles, Cranberry Township, PA, for a “system and method for testing multi-protocol storage systems.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A system and method for testing multi-protocol network access using a synthetic multi-protocol client is provided. The synthetic multi-protocol client implements one or more predefined and/or user defined tests that interleave data access operations directed to a storage system using a plurality of data access protocols.”

The patent application was filed on April 27, 2006 (11/413,023).

Performing data manipulation on storage device
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,768,898) developed by three co-inventors for a method and system “for performing data manipulation on a storage device.”

The co-inventors are Don Alvin Trimmer, Sandeep Yadav and Pratap Singh, Sunnyvale, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A method and system for performing data manipulation on a storage device is disclosed. A data manipulation command is created on a computing device, wherein the computing device is separate from the storage device. The computing device is a client or a server that requests services of a storage system to store data on a storage medium. The computing device and the storage device are connected over a network. The computing device executes a host application, and its data is stored on the medium. The computing device issues a command to the storage device to be performed on the data. The storage device executes the command and sends the result to the computing device. As a result, the data is not sent to the computing device for manipulation.”

The patent application was filed on April 26, 2007 (11/740,471).

Online data consistency checking in network storage system
with optional committal of remedial changes
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,793,223) developed by six co-inventors for “online data consistency checking in a network storage system with optional committal of remedial changes.”

The co-inventors are Yong Cho, Campbell, CA, Maya Palem, Sunnyvale, CA, Vignesh Sukumar, Santa Clara, CA, John K. Edwards, Sunnyvale, CA, David Grunwald, Santa Clara, CA, and Andy Kahn, San Francisco, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A network storage server includes a tool for detecting and fixing errors while the network storage server remains online (available for servicing client requests), which includes enabling a user to approve or disapprove remedial changes before the changes are committed. The technique bypasses the usual consistency point process for new or modified data blocks representing potential remedial changes. At a consistency point, dirty data blocks representing the potential remedial changes are written to a change log file residing outside the volume. The modified data blocks are written in sequential order to logical blocks of the change log file. In response to a user input indicating that a potential change should be committed, the corresponding modified data blocks are read from the change log file in the order in which they were written to the change log file, and they are written to persistent storage in that order.”

The patent application was filed on Feb. 9, 2009 (12/368,158).

Consistent distributed storage communication protocol semantics
in clustered storage system
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,793,432) developed by Pranab Patnaik, Kai Tan, Cary, NC, and Vivek Venkatesan, Morrisville, NC, for the “consistent distributed storage communication protocol semantics in a clustered storage system.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “Consistent distributed storage communication protocol semantics, such as SCSI target semantics, in a SAN-attached clustered storage system are disclosed. The system includes a mechanism for presenting a single distributed logical unit, comprising one or more logical sub-units, as a single logical unit of storage to a host system by associating each of the logical sub-units that make up the single distributed logical unit with a single host visible identifier that corresponds to the single distributed logical unit. The system further includes a mechanism to maintain consistent context information for each of the logical sub-units such that the logical sub-units are not visible to a host system as separate entities from the single distributed logical unit.”

The patent application was filed on Jan. 29, 2014 (14/167,220).

Storage subsystem including logic for copy-out and write
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,793,449) developed by Jeffrey S. Kimmel, Chapel Hill, NC, for a “storage subsystem including logic for copy-out and write.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A storage server receives a write request from a client system including new data and a location to store the new data. The storage server transmits a copy instruction to a storage subsystem to relocate old data at the location and transmits a write instruction to the storage subsystem to overwrite the old data with the new data. The storage subsystem includes fast stable storage in which the copy instruction and the write instruction are stored. After receiving each instruction, the storage subsystem sends an acknowledgement to the storage server. When both instructions have been acknowledged, the storage server sends an acknowledgement to the client system. The storage subsystem performs the instructions asynchronously from the client system’s write request.“

The patent application was filed on Oct. 15, 2010 (12/905,494).

Storage block alignment
NetApp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,793,465) developed by Eric P. Forgette, Mechanicsville, VA, and Jonathan H. Dascenzo, Durham, NC, for a “method and system for storage block alignment.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “Method and system for correcting misalignment between a virtual storage device block and a storage device block is provided. To align the blocks, an alignment module adjusts a logical block address and updates virtual storage device information such that a virtual machine can use a virtual storage device with the aligned blocks.“

The patent application was filed on March 9, 2010 (12/720,056).