Abstract: One embodiment of the present invention provides a system that mitigates the effects of multiple vibration sources on a set of hard disk drives (HDDs) within a computer system. During operation, the system identifies a target HDD in the set of HDDs, wherein the performance of the target HDD is affected by mechanical vibrations. The system also identifies one or more primary vibration sources from the multiple vibration sources that affect the performance of the target HDD. Next, for each of the primary vibration sources, the system measures a first time-domain signal associated with the operation of the primary vibration source using a first vibration transducer associated with the primary vibration source. The system also measures a second time-domain signal associated with the target HDD using a second vibration transducer associated with the target HDD.

Abstract: An access control mechanism that implements access control at a container level is disclosed. In one implementation, the access control mechanism provides one or more access control services, and registers these services with a container. Once registered, the access control services are exposed to other applications in the container, and those applications can invoke the services to have the access control mechanism implement access control on their behalf. The access control mechanism implements access control for all applications within the container; thus, the applications do not need to implement their own access control mechanisms. In addition, the access control mechanism is not an operating system component. Thus, by relying on the access control mechanism for access control functionality, the applications are not relying on any operating system component. As a result, the applications, the container, and the access control mechanism can be ported to and run on other operating systems/platforms.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus providing a dynamically sized, highly scalable and available server farm are disclosed. A Virtual Server Farm (VSF) is created out of a wide scale computing fabric (“Computing Grid”) which is physically constructed once and then logically divided up into VSFs for various organizations on demand. Each organization retains independent administrative control of a VSF. A VSF is dynamically firewalled within the Computing Grid. Allocation and control of the elements and topology in the VSF is performed by a Control Plane connected to all computing, networking, and storage elements in the computing grid through special control ports. No physical rewiring is necessary in order to construct VSFs in many different configurations, including single-tier Web server or multi-tier Web-server, application server, database server configurations.

Abstract: A host memory location pointer is posted from a host device to a network interface card (NIC) attached to the host device prior to receipt at the NIC of data to be placed in the host memory location corresponding to the pointer. Posting the host memory location pointer serves to surrender ownership of the host memory location from the host device to the NIC. Data received at the NIC is placed in the host memory location corresponding to the pointer. Furthermore, the NIC operates to prevent placement of the data in a portion of the host memory where data has been previously placed by the NIC. Also, the host device operates to re-assume ownership of the portion of the host memory having data placed therein by the NIC without actively reclaiming ownership of the portion of the host memory location from the NIC.

Abstract: A computer system stores a dynamically sized array as a base array that contains references to subarrays in which the (composite) array's data elements reside. Each of the base-array elements that thus refers to a respective subarray is associated with a respective subarray size. Each base-array index is thereby at least implicitly associated with a cumulative base value equal to the sum of all preceding base indexes' associated subarray sizes. In response to a request for access to the element associated with a given (composite-array) index, the array-access system identifies the base index associated with the highest cumulative base value not greater than the composite-array index and performs the access to the subarray identified by the element associated with that base index. Composite-array expansion can be performed in a multi-threaded environment without locking, simply by employing a compare-and-swap or similar atomic operation.

Abstract: A sideband scout thread processing technique is provided. The sideband scout thread processing technique utilizes sideband information to identify a subset of processor instructions for execution by a scout thread processor. The sideband information identifies instructions that need to be executed to “warm-up” a cache memory that is shared with a main processor executing the whole set of processor instructions. Thus, the main processor has fewer cache misses and reduced latencies. In one embodiment, a system includes a first processor for executing a sequence of processor instructions, a second processor for executing a subset of the sequence of processor instructions, and a cache shared between the first processor and the second processor. The second processor includes sideband circuitry configured to identify the subset of the sequence of processor instructions to execute according to sideband information associated with the sequence of processor instructions.

Abstract: Techniques for providing security context and firewalls in computing environments are disclosed. The security context includes cryptographic operations that can further enhance security. A security context block that includes a security context identification (ID) and a cryptographic system is disclosed. The security context identification (ID) can be provided for and assigned to various components of the computing system as means for security identification. Using the cryptographic system, various cryptographic operations can be performed on the security context identification (ID) to further enhance security. For example, security identifiers can be authenticated before it is presented to a firewall. After, successful authentication, the firewall can be used to determine whether the security identifier identifies an associate with access privileges.

Abstract: A mechanism is disclosed for exposing a command line interface (CLI) command as a web service by automatically generating a description document that describes the CLI command's syntax. A man page that is associated with the specified CLI command is automatically parsed. Based on the man page, a description document is automatically generated. The automatically generated description document describes the CLI command's syntax.

Abstract: A data storage device has a cartridge with tape having data and landing zones. One of the landing zones is aligned with a head during stopping of advancement of the tape to minimize damage. A data storage system is provided with a data storage device with data and landing zones, a read/write head, a motor for driving the tape and a processor for identifying the landing zone locations. A method for minimizing damage to data tape conveys base film along a coating head while intermittently dispensing a magnetic layer and a rougher coating layer to form landing zones. A method for minimizing damage to data storage tape provides a cassette with tape having intermittent data and non-data regions, that is inserted into a tape drive and a read or write function is performed. The tape is advanced to align a non-data region with a head and advancement is discontinued.

Abstract: A device adapted to optimize air duct flow in an electronic system including a printed circuit board configured to support one or more electronic components having various heights. The device includes an air duct including a rigid cross-sectional member, the air duct being adapted to facilitate air flow from an inlet port to an outlet port. Further, the rigid cross-sectional member includes an opening having an interior perimeter, the interior perimeter of the opening being attached to a flexible sheet by a pressure sensitive adhesive. The rigid cross-sectional member attached to the flexible sheet is adapted to compress one or more electronic components to the printed circuit board when the rigid cross-sectional member is mounted on the printed circuit board, and is configured to form an airtight enclosure to optimize air duct flow.

Abstract: A mechanism is disclosed for enabling a plurality of nodes on a network to collaboratively exchange sets of rendering information respecting a file. In one implementation, each node maintains its own copy of the file, and each node may access its copy of the file. Whenever a node does access the locations of the file, that node sends out a rendering information message. The rendering information message comprises the set of rendering information for the file that has been updated. The rendering information message is forwarded to each of the other nodes. When each of the other nodes receives the rendering information message, it stores the set of rendering information contained therein to a rendering history associated with a user. In this manner, histories of access in the file by all users are exchanged among the nodes, and the user on each node is able to see rendering information generated by users on the other nodes. Collaboration among the users is thus achieved.

Abstract: The invention relates to a method for controlling bandwidth. The method includes receiving a plurality of packets from a network, analyzing each of the plurality of packets by a classifier to determine to which of a plurality of temporary data structures each of the plurality of packet is forwarded, forwarding each of the plurality of packets to one of the plurality of temporary data structures as determined by the classifier, if a virtual serialization queue is operating in polling mode: requesting a number of packets from the one of the plurality of temporary data structures by the virtual serialization queue, wherein the virtual serialization queue is associated with one of the plurality of temporary data structures, and forwarding the number of packets to the virtual serialization queue.

Abstract: In a space incremental garbage collector, remembered set information for a region is stored in a set of fixed-size data structures, each of which has a representation of the information and a level of precision that differs from other data structures in the set. Remembered set information for each other region is placed in a data structure based on the density of inter-region references between the region and the other region. The remembered set information for the other region is moved from one data structure to another data structure when the density of inter-region references between the region and the other changes. Some of the data structures use bit arrays to store the information and these arrays can be combined with bit arrays produced by the collector to facilitate the identification and removal of stale remembered set entries.

Abstract: Load balancing method and system for balancing a processing load in a network, wherein load balancer upon receiving a client request selects one of a plurality of processing servers for serving the request. The selection of a processing server may be based on a location of a client and a processing server. The load balancer may comprise a load balancing master and a plurality of load balancing slaves, wherein the load balancing slaves receive client requests and transmit a selection request message to the load balancing master. The load balancing master selects a load balancing slave and/or a processing server for serving the request and generates a corresponding instruction message. The client request is served by the selected load balancing slave and the selected processing server by establishing a communication link between the client and the processing server.

Abstract: Methods for processing annotations from files are provided. The method initiates with identifying an annotation present in a source file or a class file, and identifying factories available for processing annotations. The method includes determining annotations supported by each of the available factories. Then, one of the available factories is assigned to process the annotation based on the annotation present in the source file or the class file being supported by the one of the available factories. The annotation processing tool directly accesses the class files to process the annotations. The explicitly processed class files may or may not be referenced by source files.

Abstract: A network having a plurality of nodes is disclosed. The network includes an event channel adapted to transmit an event between a publisher node and a subscriber node within the network. The network also includes a filter to identify the event on the subscriber node. The network also includes an application on the subscriber node to receive the event according to the filter.

Abstract: A method for processing a plurality of packets that includes receiving the plurality of packets from a network, analyzing each of the plurality of packets by a classifier to determine to which of a plurality of temporary data structures each of the plurality of packet is to be forwarded, forwarding each of the plurality of packets to one of the plurality of temporary data structures as determined by the classifier, forwarding a plurality of packets from the one of the plurality of temporary data structures to a virtual serialization queue associated with the one of the plurality of temporary data structures, wherein the virtual serialization queue is bound to a thread having a processing priority, and processing the plurality of packets on the virtual serialization queue using at least one processor bound to the virtual serialization queue and the processing priority.

Abstract: A method for relocating virtual to physical memory mappings in a computer system is described in which a new hardware mapping entry (HME) block is allocated at a new location in memory. Contents of an old HME block are copied to the new HME block. The new HME block is added to a linked list of HME blocks. The old HME block is then removed from the linked list. A lock is acquired during the adding and during the removing. A machine readable medium having processor instructions for relocating virtual to physical memory mappings is also described.

Abstract: An approach for partitioning virtual memory address space and identifying relocatable and non-relocatable regions of memory is provided. In one embodiment, the allocations of physical addresses and kernel virtual memory addresses are partitioned into relocatable and non-relocatable regions such that, by inspecting a virtual address, the property of the physical memory (relocatable or non-relocatable) is identified.