Abstract: An improved flexible hose for carrying fluids is disclosed. The hose has a first end and a second end, and is typically in a retracted position when no tensile force placed on an end of the hose and in an extended condition when a tensile force of a pulling nature is placed on an end of the hose. The hose has a thermoplastic cover on its outer surface. The thermoplastic cover has an interior surface and an exterior surface. On the interior surface there is a helical member adhered thereto this helical member being comprised of a material capable of carrying a current of electricity. The hose of the present invention stretches at least 100 percent over its at rest position when a pulling force is placed on one end of the hose.

Abstract: A data storage system comprising a plurality of storage nodes, each node existing at a physical location having one or more contexts. Interface mechanisms couple to each storage node to communicate storage access requests with the storage node. Data storage management processes select one or more of the storage nodes to serve a data storage request based at least in part upon the particular contexts of each of the storage nodes.

Abstract: A high availability, high reliability storage system that leverages rapid advances in commodity computing devices and the robust nature of internetwork technology such as the Internet. A system of parity distribution in accordance with the present invention allows for greater fault tolerance and levels of storage efficiency than possible with conventional RAID (levels 0-5) paradigms. Data can be recovered or made available even in the case of loss of N, N+1, or more devices or storage elements over which stripes of the data set have been distributed or partitioned.

Abstract: An improved flexible hose for carrying fluids is disclosed. The hose has a first end and a second end, and is typically in a retracted position when no tensile force placed on an end of the hose and in an extended condition when a tensile force of a pulling nature is placed on an end of the hose. The hose has a thermoplastic cover on its outer surface. The thermoplastic cover has an interior surface and an exterior surface. On the interior surface there is a helical member adhered thereto this helical member being comprised of a material capable of carrying a current of electricity. The hose of the present invention stretches at least 100 percent over its at rest position when a pulling force is placed on one end of the hose.