I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system

Details I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system

1997-10-07

2000-08-29

Chan, Eddie P.

Electrical computers and digital processing systems: memory

Storage accessing and control

Hierarchical memories

711147, 710 36, 709213, G06F 1200

Patent

active

061122815

ABSTRACT:
A method and apparatus for I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system is provided. According to the method, a requesting node transmits a request for requested data to a managing node. The managing node receives the read request from the requesting node and grants a lock on the requested data. The managing node then forwards data that identifies the requested data to a disk controller. The disk controller receives the data that identifies the requested data from the managing node and reads a data item, based on the data that identifies the requested data, from a shared disk. After reading the data item from the shared disk, the disk controller transmits the data item to the requesting node. In one embodiment, an I/O destination handle is generated that identifies a read request and a buffer cache address to which the data item should be copied. The I/O destination handle is transmitted to the disk controller to facilitate transmission and processing of the data item from the disk controller to the requesting node. As a result of forwarding data that identifies the requested data directly from the managing node to the disk controller ("I/O forwarding"), the duration of a stall is reduced, contention on resources of the system is reduced and a context switch is eliminated.

REFERENCES:
patent: 5535116 (1996-07-01), Gupta et al.
Patterson, David A. and Hennessy, John L. Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, Inc. 1996.
J.B.Carter, J.K.Bennett, W.Zwaenepoel; Techniques for Reducing Consistency-Related Communication in Distributed Shared-Memory Systems; ACM Trans. on Comp. Systems, vol. 13, No. 3, Aug. 1995, 205-243.
M.D.Hill, J.R.Larus, Cache Considerations For Multiprocessor Programmers; Communications of the ACM, Aug. 1990, vol. 33, No. 8 pp. 97-108.
J.Archibald, J-LBaer; Cache Coherence Protocols: Evaluation Using A Multiprocessor Simulation Model ACM Transactions on Computer Systems, vol. 4, No. 4, Nov. 1986, pp. 273-298.
C.Mohan, I.Narang;--Efficient Locking and Caching of Data in the Multisystem Shared Disks Transaction Environment; Advances in Database Technology, Int'l Conference on Extending Database Technology Proceedings, Mar. 1992, pp. 453-468.
M.Feeley, W.Morgan, F.Pighin, A.Karlin, H.Levy; C.Thekkath;--Implementing Global Memory Management In A Workstation Cluster; ACM SIGOPS '95, Dec. 1995, pp. 201-212.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

Rating

I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.

If you have personal experience with I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and I/O forwarding in a cache coherent shared disk computer system will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-1259687