Dell Assigned Thirteen Patents

Offloading continuous health-check and reconstruction of data using compute acceleration devices on persistent storage
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,977,136) developed by Patel, Dharmesh M., Round Rock, TX, Ali, Rizwan, Cedar Park, TX, and Chaganti, Ravikanth, Bangalore, India, for “method and system for offloading a continuous health-check and reconstruction of data using compute acceleration devices on persistent storage devices.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method for managing data includes identifying, by a compute acceleration device, CAD) of a persistent storage device, a first chunk, stored in the persistent storage device, to be health-checked using storage metadata, generating a first chunk identifier using the first chunk, making a determination that the first chunk identifier does not match a second chunk identifier stored in the storage metadata, and in response to the determination: obtaining a plurality of chunks associated with the first chunk from a plurality of persistent storage devices of a storage system, wherein the storage system comprises the persistent storage device and the plurality of persistent storage devices, regenerating the first chunk using the plurality of chunks to generate a new first chunk, storing the new first chunk in the persistent storage device, and updating the storage metadata based on storage of the new first chunk.”

The patent application was filed on August 28, 2019 (16/553,348).

Architectural data mover for RAID XOR acceleration in virtualized storage appliance
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,977,073) developed by Iyer, Shyam T., and Ramaswamy, Srikrishna, Austin, TX, for an “architectural data mover for RAID XOR acceleration in a virtualized storage appliance.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Systems and methods for I/O acceleration in a virtualized system include receiving, at a hypervisor from an application executing under a guest OS, a request to write new data to a RAID system, redirecting the request to the VSA owning the RAID drives, moving the new data from guest OS physical address space to VSA physical address space, preparing, by a RAID driver in the VSA, the new data for writing according to a RAID redundancy policy, reading, by the RAID driver into a first buffer, old data and old parity information, performing, by an architectural data mover, inline XOR copy operations to compute a difference between the old and new data, compute new parity information, and write the difference and new parity information into the second buffer, and writing, by the RAID driver, the difference and new parity information to the RAID system using the redundancy policy.”

The patent application was filed on July 10, 2019 (16/507,587).

Proactive health check and reconstruction of data
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,963,345) developed by Patel, Dharmesh M., Round Rock, TX, Ali, Rizwan, Cedar Park, TX, and Chaganti, Ravikanth, Bangalore, India, for “method and system for a proactive health check and reconstruction of data.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”In general, the invention relates to a method for managing data. The method includes identifying a first chunk to be health-checked in a fault domain using storage metadata stored in the fault domain, obtaining the chunk from the fault domain, generating, after obtaining the chunk, a first chunk identifier using the first chunk, making a determination that the first chunk identifier does not match a second chunk identifier stored in the storage metadata, and in response to the determination: obtaining a plurality of chunks associated with the first chunk from a plurality of fault domains, wherein the fault domain is not part of the plurality of fault domains, regenerating the first chunk using the plurality of chunks to generate a new first chunk, and storing the new first chunk in the fault domain.”

The patent application was filed on July 31, 2019 (16/528,602).

Layered encryption for end to end communication
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,938,792) developed by Bikumala, Sathish Kumar, Round Rock, and TX, Robison, Charles D., Buford, GA, for a “layered encryption for end to end communication.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Disclosed herein are methods, systems, and processes to provide layered encryption to facilitate end to end communication. A user input is displayed in a user interface of an input device. A public/private key pair is determined based on a random number, a provisioned seed, or a physical unclonable function (PUF) provided by the input device. A previous public/private key pair is stored in a storage device associated with the input device using a recipient public key as an index. The user input is encrypted with the recipient pubic key. The derived public key is sent as a header followed by the encrypted user input to a host computing device.”

The patent application was filed on January 31, 2018 (15/884,538).

RAID storage-device-assisted deferred Q data determination
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,936,420) developed by Kotzur, Gary Benedict, Austin, TX, Lynn, William Emmett, Round Rock, TX, Marks, Kevin Thomas, Georgetown, TX, Nelogal, Chandrashekar, and Giannoules, James Peter, Round Rock, TX, for a “RAID storage-device-assisted deferred Q data determination system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A RAID storage-device-assisted deferred Q data determination system includes a RAID primary data drive that retrieves second primary data via DMA with a host system, and XOR’s it with its first primary data to produce first interim parity data that it DMA’s to a RAID parity data drive. The RAID parity data drive XOR’s its first parity data and the first interim parity data to produce second parity data. The RAID parity data drive also performs GF operations on the first interim parity data and its second interim parity data and XOR’s the results to produce first interim Q data that it DMA’s to a RAID Q data drive. The RAID Q data drive XOR’s the first interim Q data and its second interim Q data to produce third interim Q data that it XOR’s with its first Q data to produce second Q data.”

The patent application was filed on September 27, 2019 (16/586,530).

Power control based on power consumption of storage devices
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,877,553) developed by Mugunda, Chandrasekhar, Austin, TX, Kulkarni, Yogesh P., Round Rock, TX, Rao, Balaji Bapu Gururaja, and An, Rui, Austin, TX, for “systems and methods for power control based on power consumption of storage devices.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A system may include a rack, a rack manager, and a block controller. The rack manager may be configured to communicatively couple to each of respective baseboard management controllers of information handling systems of the rack and also configured to manage power consumption by information handling resources housed in the rack. The block controller may be configured to monitor and report information regarding power consumption by the plurality of storage resources to the at least one of the baseboard management controllers, the at least one of the baseboard management controllers may be configured to communicate the information regarding power consumption by the plurality of storage resources to the rack manager, and the rack manager may be configured to manage power consumption by information handling resources housed in the rack based on the information regarding power consumption by the plurality of storage resources.”

The patent application was filed on April 13, 2018 (15/953,243).

Two tier data deduplication using weighted graphs
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,860,555) developed by Ippatapu, Venkata L R, Westborough, MA, for “method and apparatus for two tier data deduplication using weighted graphs.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method of improving a data storage system includes dividing input/output (I/O) data into a plurality of blocks, and deduplicating the I/O data to produce deduplicated I/O data. The deduplication includes determining whether a first block is a duplicate block of another one of the blocks, and in response to determining that the first block is a duplicate block, replacing the duplicate block with a reference to the first block. The method determines whether the first block has a maximum overlapping area of duplicate data with a particular one of the blocks that is not a duplicate block, and replaces the particular block with a reference to the first block and to non-overlapping data.”

The patent application was filed on August 27, 2018 (16/113,477).

Allocating and migrating workloads across information technology environment based on persistent memory availability
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,860,385) developed by Kelly, John, Mallow Cork, Ireland, for “method and system for allocating and migrating workloads across an information technology environment based on persistent memory availability.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method and system for allocating and migrating workloads across an information technology (IT) environment based on persistent memory availability. Specifically, the method and system disclosed herein entail the intelligent placement of workloads on appropriate nodes of a node cluster based on workload requirements and node capabilities and/or resources availability. Further, workloads may be ranked based on a workload priority assigned to any particular workload, if available, or based on logged system calls issued by virtual machines hosting any particular workload. Subsequently, higher ranked workloads may be granted priority access to nodes that host healthier persistent memory, if any, or host higher performance traditional storage.”

The patent application was filed on April 30, 2018 (15/966,295).

Fragmented firmware storage
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,860,307) developed by Suryanarayana, Shekar Babu, Bangalore, India, and Joshi, Anand P., Round Rock

TX, for “fragmented firmware storage system and method therefor.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method includes providing a runtime service to receive a payload containing a basic input-output system (BIOS) image and to generate a firmware storage policy. The firmware storage policy identifies a data storage device to store first firmware instructions of the BIOS image, and identifies another data storage device to store second firmware instructions of the BIOS image. The method further includes providing a boot service to store the BIOS image according to the firmware storage policy.”

The patent application was filed on April 24, 2019 (16/392,854).

Centralized storage-connected switch port auto-configuration
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,855,805) developed by Kutty, Ajan Daniel, Austin, TX, Nagalla, and Srinivasa Rao, Round Rock, TX, for a “centralized storage-connected switch port auto-configuration system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A centralized storage-connected switch port auto-configuration system includes an SDN controller device that receives, from an SDN switch device subsequent to a storage device being connected to a switch port on the SDN switch device, discovery information and uses it to identify the switch port. The SDN controller device then provides SDN communications to the SDN switch device that include a port packet data unit size configuration, a port traffic suppression configuration, and a port loop prevention configuration. The SDN switch device applies the port packet data unit size configuration to configure a packet data unit size transmittable via the switch port, the port traffic suppression configuration to configure the amount of bandwidth of the switch port that will be available to transmit at least one type of data traffic, and the port loop prevention configuration to configure loop prevention designations that will be available for the switch port.”

The patent application was filed on May 26, 2017 (15/606,244).

Simulated fibre channel trunking
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,855,595) developed by Jayakumar, Avinash, Subbiah, Ramesh Kumar, Varghese, Vibin, and Sridhar, Praveen, Tamil Nadu, India, for a “simulated fibre channel trunking system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A FC networking system includes a first FC networking device that is coupled to a FC storage system. A second FC networking device is coupled to a server device and includes a first FC PHY converter that is coupled to the first FC networking device via a first and a second FC link. The second FC networking device also includes an Ethernet switch processor that is coupled to the first FC PHY converter via a plurality of Ethernet links. The Ethernet links include a first Ethernet link that is mapped to the second FC link and a second Ethernet link that is mapped to the third FC link. The second FC networking device groups the first Ethernet link with the second Ethernet link to provide an aggregated interface, and load balances FCoE traffic between the first Ethernet link and the second Ethernet link.”

The patent application was filed on September 27, 2018 (16/144,037).

Host application to access and verify contents within non-volatile storage of information handling
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,853,307) developed by Hargrave, Jordan P., Austin, TX, Edwards, William C., Liles, Terry Wayne, Round Rock, TX, and Weilnau, Wayne R., Austin, TX, for “system and method for a host application to access and verify contents within non-volatile storage of an information handling system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”An information handling system (IHS) and a method for a host application to access and verify contents within all non-volatile storage of the IHS. The method utilizes an access controller that has access to non-volatile storage which cannot be directly accessed from a host operating system. The access controller, upon receiving a request from the host application to view contents in a non-volatile storage that is not accessible to the host application, copies the contents of the un-accessible non-volatile storage to a storage medium communicatively coupled to the access controller. The access controller then presents the storage medium as a virtual storage device to the host application, enabling the host application to access the copied contents of the un-accessible non-volatile storage.”

The patent application was filed on July 28, 2017 (15/663,547).

Chassis-based virtual storage drive configuration
Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX, has been assigned a patent (10,853,211) developed by Nelogal, Chandrashekar, Round Rock, TX, Bisa, Rama Rao, Vishwanath, Manjunath, Gavvala, Pavan Kumar, Bangalore, India, and Pawar, Prakash Balasaheb, Ahmednagar, India, for “system and method for chassis-based virtual storage drive configuration.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Multiple IHSs (Information Handling Systems) may be installed as components of a chassis that has access to a plurality of storage devices via a chassis management controller. An IHS requests configuration of a virtual storage profile, such as a RAID configuration. A remote access controller of the IHS determines physical storage requirements for implementing the requested virtual storage profile. Based on the physical storage requirements, the chassis management controller selects storage devices from idle storage devices mapped to one of the storage controllers installed in one of the IHSs supported by a chassis management controller. The selected storage devices are mapped to the storage controller and used to implement the virtual storage profile. The chassis management controller manages a global pool of spares from the idle storage device for virtual storage profiles supported by the supported storage controllers.”

The patent application was filed on October 25, 2018 (16/170,290).