Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed for automatically identifying and recovering storage objects. A storage system includes a plurality of storage objects associated with storage resources in communication with the storage system, and a storage processor. The storage processor initiates a recovery process in response to a first state of the storage processor and determines a status for each of the plurality of storage objects. The storage processor identifies one or more storage objects requiring recovery based on the status of each of the storage objects and determines a first storage object to recover based on a predetermined hierarchy of storage objects. The predetermined hierarchy is based on a dependency between one or more of the storage objects. The storage processor determines a recovery operation to recover the first storage object and initiates the recovery operation on the first storage object.

Abstract: Described are licensing techniques that may include: receiving a license specifying a maximum limit of a resource where the maximum limit denotes a maximum allowable consumption amount of the resource; providing the maximum limit to one or more software components; and enforcing, by the one or more software components, consumption of the maximum limit of the resource whereby an actual amount of the resource consumed is not allowed to exceed the maximum limit. The maximum limit may be a maximum storage capacity limit in connection with a virtualized storage system or appliance as well as a non-virtualized storage system or appliance. Software components may enforce the maximum limit, or a dependent limit derived therefrom, on the control path and data path. Limits specified in the license, or a dependent limit determined therefrom, may denote a maximum or minimum limit.

Abstract: While providing a storage service to a client system, a storage system maintains a complete set of storage service metadata for the service on the same storage device that stores the user data received from the client system. When an event is detected that requires the storage service to be moved to a new storage system, the storage service can be moved to a new storage system by moving the storage device containing both the user data and the storage service metadata to the new storage system. The new storage system detects the storage device that has been moved, and detects the storage service metadata and user data. The new storage system then uses the storage service metadata and user data from the storage device to immediately reestablish the storage service with the client system, without having to perform a separate step of copying the storage service metadata from the previous storage system.

Abstract: A method, of scheduling storage commands for processing on a virtual machine (VM) operating on a computing device includes (a) intercepting, by a front end storage scheduler module running on the VM, a set of storage commands each of which is directed at one of a plurality of virtual disks assigned to the VM, the plurality of virtual disks sharing underlying storage, (b) queueing the intercepted storage commands for each virtual disk into a respective front-end queue for each virtual disk, and (c) selectively dequeueing storage commands from the front-end queues onto their respective virtual disks in a manner that prioritizes certain virtual disks over others, wherein the selectively dequeueing is performed in a different order than the queueing. An apparatus, system, and computer program product for performing a similar method are also provided.