Abstract: A method and apparatus to decrease the boot time and the hibernate awaken time of a computer system is presented. Static and dynamic configuration data is stored in flash memory. The size of flash memory is selected so that the initialization time of the configuration data stored in the flash memory is approximately equal to the spin-up time of the disk drive where the operating system is stored. During power down or entry into a hibernate mode, the computer system determines the static and dynamic configuration data to be stored in flash memory based on a history of prior uses. Data is also stored in the flash memory during system operation to reduce the number of times the disk drive is spun up. When the computer system is powered up or awakened from hibernation, the configuration data in flash memory is initialized while the disk drive is spinning up.

Abstract: A method and apparatus to decrease the boot time and the hibernate awaken time of a computer system is presented. Static and dynamic configuration data is stored in flash memory. The size of flash memory is selected so that the initialization time of the configuration data stored in the flash memory is approximately equal to the spin-up time of the disk drive where the operating system is stored. During power down or entry into a hibernate mode, the computer system determines the static and dynamic configuration data to be stored in flash memory based on a history of prior uses. Data is also stored in the flash memory during system operation to reduce the number of times the disk drive is spun up. When the computer system is powered up or awakened from hibernation, the configuration data in flash memory is initialized while the disk drive is spinning up.

Abstract: A method and apparatus to improve the read/write performance of a hard drive is presented. The hard drive includes solid state, non-volatile (NV) memory as a read/write cache. Data specified by the operating system is stored in the NV memory. The operating system provides a list of data to be put in NV memory. The data includes data to be pinned in NV memory and data that is dynamic. Pinned data persists in NV memory until the operating system commands it to be flushed. Dynamic data can be flushed by the hard drive controller. Data sent by an application for storage is temporary stored in NV memory in data blocks until the operating system commits it to the disk.

Abstract: A method and apparatus is provided that provides a reliable diskless network-bootable computers using a local non-volatile memory (NVM) cache. The NVM cache is used by the computer when the network is temporarily unavailable or slow. The cache is later synchronized with a remote boot server having remote storage volumes when network conditions improve. It is determined if data is to be stored in the NVM cache or the remote storage volume. Data sent to the remote storage volume is transactionally written and the data is cached in the NVM cache if a network outage is occurring or a transaction complete message has not been received. The data stored in the NVM cache allows the user to continue operating during network outages and the computer can be cold-booted using the data in the NVM cache if the network is unavailable.

Abstract: A method and apparatus to decrease the boot time and the hibernate awaken time of a computer system is presented. Static and dynamic configuration data is stored in flash memory. The size of flash memory is selected so that the initialization time of the configuration data stored in the flash memory is approximately equal to the spin-up time of the disk drive where the operating system is stored. During power down or entry into a hibernate mode, the computer system determines the static and dynamic configuration data to be stored in flash memory based on a history of prior uses. Data is also stored in the flash memory during system operation to reduce the number of times the disk drive is spun up. When the computer system is powered up or awakened from hibernation, the configuration data in flash memory is initialized while the disk drive is spinning up.

Abstract: A proactive, resilient and self-tuning memory management system and method that result in actual and perceived performance improvements in memory management, by loading and maintaining data that is likely to be needed into memory, before the data is actually needed. The system includes mechanisms directed towards historical memory usage monitoring, memory usage analysis, refreshing memory with highly-valued (e.g., highly utilized) pages, I/O pre-fetching efficiency, and aggressive disk management. Based on the memory usage information, pages are prioritized with relative values, and mechanisms work to pre-fetch and/or maintain the more valuable pages in memory. Pages are pre-fetched and maintained in a prioritized standby page set that includes a number of subsets, by which more valuable pages remain in memory over less valuable pages. Valuable data that is paged out may be automatically brought back, in a resilient manner.

Abstract: When a client issues a network transaction like HTTP requests to a server, such requests may require a connection to be established between the client and the server over a reliable transport like TCP (if no such connection is available). Such connection establishment takes time, and delays the completion of the transaction, thereby degrading user experience. This invention attempts to reduce this delay by transparently executing idempotent transactions in parallel with the connection establishment phase. In case the end hosts do not support the functionality of this invention, said functionality can be transparently added through software components between the client and server. Client and server side intermediate components simulate connection establishment making it appear to corresponding application layers that a connection is established.

Abstract: A method and apparatus is provided that provides a reliable diskless network-bootable computers using a local non-volatile memory (NVM) cache. The NVM cache is used by the computer when the network is temporarily unavailable or slow. The cache is later synchronized with a remote boot server having remote storage volumes when network conditions improve. It is determined if data is to be stored in the NVM cache or the remote storage volume. Data sent to the remote storage volume is transactionally written and the data is cached in the NVM cache if a network outage is occurring or a transaction complete message has not been received. The data stored in the NVM cache allows the user to continue operating during network outages and the computer can be cold-booted using the data in the NVM cache if the network is unavailable.

Abstract: Mechanisms for prefetching without requiring parsing of a Web page. References to associated images, sound, video, and executable files and hyperlinked Web pages are included in the header portion of the network message used to deliver the Web page. The associated resources may include properly identified resources (e.g., images and sounds) that are to be rendered with the image, or which are known to have a high probability (if not a certainty) of being selected. The associated resources may also included other resources (e.g., hyperlinked Web pages) that have a lesser probability of being selected and which are only retrieved when there is a detected period of browser idle time. That period of idle time is selected such that it is less likely that the user is going to issue an express request for another Web page during a prefetching operation.

Abstract: A proactive, resilient and self-tuning memory management system and method that result in actual and perceived performance improvements in memory management, by loading and maintaining data that is likely to be needed into memory, before the data is actually needed. The system includes mechanisms directed towards historical memory usage monitoring, memory usage analysis, refreshing memory with highly-valued (e.g., highly utilized) pages, I/O pre-fetching efficiency, and aggressive disk management. Based on the memory usage information, pages are prioritized with relative values, and mechanisms work to pre-fetch and/or maintain the more valuable pages in memory. Pages are pre-fetched and maintained in a prioritized standby page set that includes a number of subsets, by which more valuable pages remain in memory over less valuable pages. Valuable data that is paged out may be automatically brought back, in a resilient manner.

Abstract: A method and apparatus to improve the read/write performance of a hard drive is presented. The hard drive includes solid state, non-volatile (NV) memory as a read/write cache. Data specified by the operating system is stored in the NV memory. The operating system provides a list of data to be put in NV memory. The data includes data to be pinned in NV memory and data that is dynamic. Pinned data persists in NV memory until the operating system commands it to be flushed. Dynamic data can be flushed by the hard drive controller. Data sent by an application for storage is temporary stored in NV memory in data blocks until the operating system commits it to the disk.

Abstract: A method and apparatus to decrease the boot time and the hibernate awaken time of a computer system is presented. Static and dynamic configuration data is stored in flash memory. The size of flash memory is selected so that the initialization time of the configuration data stored in the flash memory is approximately equal to the spin-up time of the disk drive where the operating system is stored. During power down or entry into a hibernate mode, the computer system determines the static and dynamic configuration data to be stored in flash memory based on a history of prior uses. Data is also stored in the flash memory during system operation to reduce the number of times the disk drive is spun up. When the computer system is powered up or awakened from hibernation, the configuration data in flash memory is initialized while the disk drive is spinning up.

Abstract: A method and system for improving the performance of memory in constrained virtual memory environment by reducing physical paging activity is provided. Accordingly, in a method and system in accordance with the present invention, the pages stolen or removed from the active processes are compressed then placed in the free list. In so doing, the additional space provided via this compression allows for more real memory to be available for other purposes.

Abstract: A method and system for enabling the monitoring of a target software routine in a stripped object executable on a computer system. The system enables monitor instrumentation of the target routine without access to or recompiling the source code of the object and without access to information required to link with the stripped object. A single demultiplexor entry for each target routine provides access to common instrumentation code and to user specified entry and exit routines for the particular target routine. Common instrumentation code is not replicated when used to monitor a number of software programs. User specified entry and exit routines are used to collect selected performance and system state data. Common instrumentation code is provided to link the target routines to the user specified entry and exit routines. The standard link interface allows the entry and exit routines to be written in high level languages.