Huawei Technologies Assigned Nineteen Patents

Global snapshots of distributed storage
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,055,185) developed by Shishkin, Eduard, Munich, Germany, for “method and system for global snapshots of distributed storage.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A storage manager for managing storage of files on a distributed logical volume includes a configuration manager configured to manage an archive of configurations of the distributed logical volume, and a snapshot manager configured to create a global snapshot of the distributed logical volume and, in response to a roll-back request, restore a previous global snapshot of the distributed logical volume based on a stored configuration of the distributed logical volume and stored subvolume snapshots of subvolumes of the distributed logical volume.”

The patent application was filed on July 12, 2019 (16/510,183).

Key-value storage
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Guangdong, China, has been assigned a patent (11,048,642) developed by Gao, Feng, and Yuan, Huiqin, Hangzhou, China, for “key-value storage method, apparatus, and system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Embodiments of this application provide a key-value storage method, apparatus, and system, to resolve at least a problem that currently no related solution can combine key-value storage with such efficient storage protocol as an NVMe protocol. The method includes: writing, by a host after detecting a key-value storage request, a first instruction code and address information that are carried in the key-value storage request to a field defined in a protocol, to constitute a first storage request instruction sequence, where the first instruction code is an instruction code defined based on a reserved extension field in the protocol, and interacting, by the host, with the storage controller, so that the storage controller obtains the first storage request instruction sequence. This application is applicable to the field of storage technologies.”

The patent application was filed on February 27, 2019 (16/287,826).

Cluster system with calculation and storage converged
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,042,311) developed by Gu, Jiongjiong, Wang, Daohui, and Min, Xiaoyong, Shenzhen, China, for “cluster system with calculation and storage converged.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Embodiments of the present invention provide a cluster system with calculation and storage converged, including: a resource server group, where the resource server group includes at least two resource servers, each resource server in the resource server group has at least one of: a calculation resource and a storage resource, at least one resource server in the resource server group has a calculation resource and a storage resource, and the storage resource includes a persistent disk and a cache that corresponds to the persistent disk, and a storage resource control module, configured to construct a shared storage resource pool by using storage resources in the resource server group, so as to provide a storage service, where storage resources included in each storage resource pool are from at least two resource servers in the resource server group.”

The patent application was filed on October 30, 2019 (16/669,271).

Storage
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,036,535) developed by Zhong, Yong, Lin, Ming, Peng, Ruilin, and Zhao, Jun, Shenzhen, China, for “data storage method and apparatus.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A data storage method and a physical server are provided. M virtual machines are deployed on a plurality of physical servers. The M virtual machines are respectively deployed as M data nodes in a distributed storage system. A metadata node in the distributed storage system receives a data storage request of a client, and determines identifiers of N virtual machines from the M virtual machines based on stored grouping information. The grouping information records a mapping relationship between a plurality of anti-affinity groups and identifiers of the M virtual machines.”

The patent application was filed on November 13, 2018 (16/188,951).

Data processing
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,032,368) developed by Fang, Xin, Beijing, China, for “data processing method, apparatus, and system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Embodiments of the present invention provide a data management technology. An OSD receives a strip write request sent by a client server, where the strip write request carries a to-be-written strip, a version number of the to-be-written strip, an offset of the to-be-written strip, and an object ID of the to-be-written strip, and the OSD writes the to-be-written strip into a storage location determined by using the object ID, the version number of the to-be-written strip, and the offset of the to-be-written strip. By applying the present invention, a quantity of object IDs can be reduced.”

The patent application was filed on June 27, 2017 (15/634,819).

Storage method and apparatus
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,030,178) developed by Bi, Jieshan, and Guo, Yijun, Shenzhen, China, for “data storage method and apparatus.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A data storage method and apparatus, where the method includes obtaining a primary index of a data object, where a row identifier of the primary index includes at least one field, determining a row identifier of a secondary index of the data object, where the row identifier of the secondary index includes an index field and a field other than the index field in the at least one field of the row identifier of the primary index, and the index field is different from the first field in the at least one field of the row identifier of the primary index, generating the secondary index of the data object according to the row identifier of the secondary index, and storing the data object according to the primary index and the secondary index, thereby saving storage space.”

The patent application was filed on May 29, 2018 (15/991,845).

Storage device to send source file and clone file of source file to backup storage device
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,030,048) developed by Xiao, Jianlong, and Huang, Keji, Chengdu, China, for “method a source storage device to send a source file and a clone file of the source file to a backup storage device, a source storage device and a backup storage device.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method for a source storage device to send a source file and a clone file of the source file to a backup storage device. The source storage device sends a data block to the backup storage device to be stored as a target file. Then, the source storage device determines that the source file is associated with the clone file by searching a cloning recorder with a source file ID of the source file. Based upon the determining, the source storage device sends a clone creating request including the source file ID to the backup storage device to instruct the backup storage device to create a clone file of the target file. Thus, the method is capable of replicating the clone file of the file without sending a large number of mapping data.”

The patent application was filed on March 15, 2017 (15/459,984).

File management, distributed storage, and management node
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,029,848) developed by Xu, Jun, Nanjing, China, Zhao, Junfeng, and Wang, Yuangang, Shenzhen, China, for “file management method, distributed storage system, and management node.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A file management method, a distributed storage system, and a management node are disclosed. In the distributed storage system, after receiving a file creation request sent by a host for requesting to create a file in a distributed storage system, a management node allocates, to the file, first virtual space from global virtual address space of the distributed storage system, where local virtual address space of each storage node in the distributed storage system is corresponding to a part of the global virtual address space. Then, the management node records metadata of the file, where the metadata of the file includes information about the first virtual space, and the information about the first virtual space is used to point to local virtual address space of a storage node that is used to store the file. Further, the management node sends, the information about the first virtual space to the host.”

The patent application was filed on November 1, 2018 (16/178,220).

Storage interface, timing control, and storage
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,023,176) developed by Tu, Jun, Shenzhen, China, for “storage interface, timing control method, and storage system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”The storage interface includes a first programmable input/output unit configured to perform phase inversion on a clock signal that is output by the master controller, and output the phase-inverted clock signal to the storage device. The storage interface includes a second programmable input/output unit configured to delay a data signal that is output by the master controller, and output the delayed data signal to the storage device, where the delayed data signal is delayed by a time .DELTA.T relative to the clock signal that is output by the master controller, and T.sub.CLK/2-.DELTA.T.gtoreq.T.sub.ISU and .DELTA.T.gtoreq.T.sub.IH, where T.sub.CLK represents a period of the clock signal, T.sub.ISU represents a shortest input setup time required by the storage device in each of different data rate modes, and T.sub.IH represents a shortest input hold time employed by the storage device in each of different data rate modes.”

The patent application was filed on April 28, 2017 (16/605,135).

Node interconnection, resource control node, and server
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,023,143) developed by Yu, Baifeng, Hangzhou, China, Yu, Zhou, and Gu, Jiongjiong, Shenzhen, China, for “node interconnection apparatus, resource control node, and server system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Embodiments of application provide a node interconnection apparatus, and a method implemented by the node interconnection apparatus. The node interconnection apparatus includes a computing node and a resource control node, and a device interconnection interface connecting the two. Each of the computing node and the resource control node includes a processing unit and a storage unit, and the resource control node further includes a resource interface for connecting with a network storage device. The resource control node manages storage resource of the network storage device, and when the computing node needs started up, the resource control node obtains operating system startup information from the network storage device and provide the information to the computing node. The computing node can start up without the need for storing startup information locally. Therefore, storage resource inside the computing node is saved.”

The patent application was filed on May 20, 2019 (16/416,280).

Multi root I/O virtualization
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,016,817) developed by Druzhinin, Igor Vyacheslavovich, Krinov, Peter Sergeevich, Mysov, Mikhail Evgenyevich, and Zenkovich, Mikhail Valerevich, Shenzhen, China, for a “multi root I/O virtualization system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A virtualization system includes at least one storage device, a plurality of computing nodes, each computing node coupled to at least one of the storage devices, each computing node comprising a physical function (PF) agent, and a plurality of virtual machines, where the PF agent of a first computing node of the computing nodes is configured to receive from a virtual machine of the virtual machines a request for retrieving or writing data and to obtain placement information indicating a second computing node of the computing nodes for retrieving or writing data, and the PF Agent of the first computing node is configured to communicate with the PF Agent of the second computing node to retrieve data from the second computing node or write data to the second computing node based on the placement information.”

The patent application was filed on April 13, 2018 (15/952,976).

Storage unit and static random access memory
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,004,502) developed by Chi, Sijie, Ji, Bingwu, Zhao, Tanfu, and Zhou, Yunming, Shenzhen, China, for “storage unit and static random access memory.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A storage unit and a static random access memory (SRAM) where storage unit includes a latch, and the latch provides a first storage bit. The storage unit further includes a first metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) transistor. A gate of the first MOS transistor is coupled to the first storage bit, a source of the first MOS transistor is coupled to a first read line, and a drain of the first MOS transistor is coupled to a second read line. In a first state, the first read line is a read word line, and the second read line is a read bit line, or in a second state, the second read line is a read word line, and the first read line is a read bit line. The storage unit according to embodiments of the present invention can implement an exchange between a read word line and a read bit line.”

The patent application was filed on March 3, 2020 (16/807,594).

Accessing storage disk
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,003,719) developed by Luo, Xiong, Chengdu, China, for “method and apparatus for accessing a storage disk.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”The application provides a data writing/reading method. A switching device receives a key-value packet from a server, acquires a partition number, queries a partition view to obtain a storage disk address corresponding to the partition number, and converts the key-value packet into a storage disk packet by changing a destination address of the key-value packet to the storage disk address. The switching device sends the storage disk packet to a storage disk corresponding to the storage disk address.”

The patent application was filed on April 11, 2017 (15/484,152).

IO request processing according to processing sorting indexes
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (11,003,360) developed by Yu, Si, Gong, Junhui, Zhao, Cong, Wang, Cheng, and Lu, Yue, Hangzhou, China, for an “IO request processing according to processing sorting indexes.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A storage controller includes a distribution core, a plurality of sorting cores, and a request processing core. The three types of cores are separately configured to distribute an input/output (IO) request to different sorting cores, generate a processing sorting index for each IO request, and process the IO request according to a value of the processing sorting index of each IO request to flexibly schedule the IO request received by the storage controller.”

The patent application was filed on June 28, 2019 (16/457,086).

Storage method and apparatus
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (10,972,542) developed by Sun, Guilin, Liu, Huaizhong, Zha, Li, and Xin, Xianyin, Shenzhen, China, for “data storage method and apparatus.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method and apparatus for data storage and retrieval is disclosed. In the method, a data storage device receives a data write request that is sent by a first tenant, and determines, from a plurality of resource zones (RZs) and based on the data write request and storage permission of the first tenant for each of the plurality of resource zones RZs. The data storage device further determines distribution of N duplicates in the at least one RZ based on the data write request and a first data distribution policy, and stores the N duplicates into at least one node corresponding to the at least one RZ based on distribution of the N duplicates in the at least one RZ and a second data distribution policy.”

The patent application was filed on September 27, 2019 (16/586,074).

Storage device operation and physical server
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (10,970,105) developed by Wang, Shen, Xi’an, China, for “storage device operation method and physical server.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A storage device operation method is applied to the physical server. A storage card is inserted into the physical server. When a virtual machine on the physical server receives a data read/write instruction, the virtual machine generates an I/O request for a physical storage device, and sends the I/O request to a client in the storage card, the client transmits the I/O request to a server, so that the server performs an I/O operation on the physical storage device based on the I/O request. Since the virtual machine directly sends the I/O request to the client in the storage card without using a hypervisor in the physical server, computing resources of the physical server are conserved.”

The patent application was filed on April 26, 2019 (16/396,213).

Data access, routing apparatus, and storage
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Guangdong, China, has been assigned a patent (10,956,077) developed by Li, Tianxiang, Beijing, China, Xu, Jun, Nanjing, China, and Wang, Yuangang, Shenzhen, China, for “storage device operation method and physical server.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A data access method, a routing apparatus, and a storage system are provided. The method is applied to a storage system including a first storage device, a second storage device, and a routing apparatus. A logical unit in each storage device includes at least one first-type logical block and at least one second-type logical block. According to the method, when sending access requests to the storage devices in the storage system according to a preset rule, the routing apparatus sends access requests corresponding to same target logical blocks to one of the storage devices according to a preset rule. This reduces network overheads between the storage system and the application server, and improves efficiency of processing the access requests by the storage system.”

The patent application was filed on March 15, 2019 (16/355,595).

Storing data shards
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Guangdong, China, has been assigned a patent (10,942,828) developed by Wang, Huaqiong, Shenzhen, China, and Gao, Chao, Hangzhou, China, for “method for storing data shards, apparatus, and system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”This application relates to distributed storage, and in particular, to a distributed shard storage technology. In a method for storing data shards in a distributed storage system, M data nodes on which to-be-stored data will be stored are determined, N replicas of the to-be-stored data are obtained, and each of the N replicas is sharded into X data shards in a same sharding mode. Then the to-be-stored data is stored on the M storage nodes, that is, N replicas of each of the X data shards are respectively stored on N storage nodes, and a quantity of data shards whose data shard replicas are stored on same N storage nodes is P or P+1, where P is an integer quotient of X divided by C.sub.M.sup.N.”

The patent application was filed on February 7, 2019 (16/270,048).

Storage method, apparatus, and system
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., Shenzhen, China, has been assigned a patent (10,915,397) developed by Liu, Xiaowei, Wu, Huatao, and Yin, Lihui, Chengdu, China, for “data storage method, apparatus, and system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A storage client needs to store to-be-written data into a distributed storage system, and storage nodes corresponding to a first data unit assigned for the to-be-written data by a management server are only some nodes in a storage node group. When receiving a status of the first data unit returned by the management server, the storage client may determine quantities of data blocks and parity blocks needing to be generated during EC coding on the to-be-written data. The storage client stores the generated data blocks and parity blocks into some storage nodes designated by the management server in a partition where the first data unit is located. Accordingly, dynamic adjustment of an EC redundancy ratio is implemented, and the management server may exclude some nodes in the partition from a storage range of the to-be-written data based on a requirement, thereby reducing a data storage IO amount.”

The patent application was filed on April 12, 2019 (16/382,200).