Patents by Inventor Wendell W. Wilkinson

Wendell W. Wilkinson has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 7003700
    Abstract: A coupling facility is coupled to one or more other coupling facilities via one or more peer links. The coupling of the facilities enables various functions to be supported, including the duplexing of structures of the coupling facilities. Duplexing is performed on a structure basis, and thus, a coupling facility may include duplexed structures, as well as non-duplexed or simplexed structures.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 8, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 21, 2006
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David A. Elko, Steven N. Goss, Michael J. Jordan, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6813726
    Abstract: Restarting of coupling facility commands. A restart token is obtained from one coupling facility command and used to restart another coupling facility command. The command from which the restart token is obtained is a different command from the command being restarted. In one example, the command being restarted is a duplexed command.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 1, 2001
    Date of Patent: November 2, 2004
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Dennis J. Dahlen, David A. Elko, Michael J. Jordan, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6704766
    Abstract: A method and apparatus for dynamically controlling the dispatching of a coupling facility operating in a logical partition sharing a processor resource with one or more other logical partitions issuing requests to the coupling facility. A plurality of coupling facility dispatching modes differing in their relative dispatch duration are defined. One dispatching mode is initially selected, and the number of requests received from the other logical partitions within a predetermined interval while in a selected dispatching mode is determined. Transitions between the defined dispatching modes are made in accordance with the number of requests received within the sampling interval in the selected dispatching mode.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 10, 1997
    Date of Patent: March 9, 2004
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Steven N. Goss, Gary M. King, Jeffrey P. Kubala, John C. Nagy, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Publication number: 20030196025
    Abstract: A coupling facility is coupled to one or more other coupling facilities via one or more peer links. The coupling of the facilities enables various functions to be supported, including the duplexing of structures of the coupling facilities. Duplexing is performed on a structure basis, and thus, a coupling facility may include duplexed structures, as well as non-duplexed or simplexed structures.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 1, 2001
    Publication date: October 16, 2003
    Applicant: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Dennis J. Dahlen, David A. Elko, Steven N. Goss, Steven B. Jones, Michael J. Jordan, Georgette L. Kurdt, Jeffrey M. Nick, Kelly B. Pushong, David H. Surman, Douglas Westcott, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6615373
    Abstract: A coupling facility is coupled to one or more other coupling facilities via one or more peer links. The coupling of the facilities enables various functions to be supported, including the duplexing of structures of the coupling facilities. Duplexing is performed on a structure basis, and thus, a coupling facility may include duplexed structures, as well as non-duplexed or simplexed structures.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 8, 2002
    Date of Patent: September 2, 2003
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David A. Elko, Steven N. Goss, Michael J. Jordan, Jeffrey M. Nick, Douglas Westcott, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6609214
    Abstract: Storage structures of a shared storage processor of a computing environment are copied. A copy operation for a storage structure of the shared storage processor is initiated. Although the storage structure is owned by an exploiter of the storage structure, at least a portion of the contents of the storage structure is copied via an operating system of the computing environment. The at least a portion of the contents are copied from the storage structure to another storage structure of the computing environment. Both storage structures may be located within the same shared storage processor or within different shared storage processors.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 23, 1999
    Date of Patent: August 19, 2003
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Dennis J. Dahlen, David A. Elko, Jeffrey M. Nick, David H. Surman, Douglas Westcott, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Ruth A. Allen, Mark A. Brooks
  • Publication number: 20030149909
    Abstract: A coupling facility is coupled to one or more other coupling facilities via one or more peer links. The coupling of the facilities enables various functions to be supported, including the duplexing of structures of the coupling facilities. Duplexing is performed on a structure basis, and thus, a coupling facility may include duplexed structures, as well as non-duplexed or simplexed structures.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 8, 2002
    Publication date: August 7, 2003
    Applicant: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David A. Elko, Steven N. Goss, Michael J. Jordan, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Publication number: 20030149920
    Abstract: A coupling facility is coupled to one or more other coupling facilities via one or more peer links. The coupling of the facilities enables various functions to be supported, including the duplexing of structures of the coupling facilities. Duplexing is performed on a structure basis, and thus, a coupling facility may include duplexed structures, as well as non-duplexed or simplexed structures.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 8, 2002
    Publication date: August 7, 2003
    Applicant: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David A. Elko, Steven N. Goss, Michael J. Jordan, Jeffrey M. Nick, Douglas Westcott, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Publication number: 20030088806
    Abstract: Restarting of coupling facility commands. A restart token is obtained from one coupling facility command and used to restart another coupling facility command. The command from which the restart token is obtained is a different command from the command being restarted. In one example, the command being restarted is a duplexed command.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 1, 2001
    Publication date: May 8, 2003
    Applicant: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Dennis J. Dahlen, David A. Elko, Michael J. Jordan, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6546466
    Abstract: Cache structures of a shared storage processor of a computing environment are copied. A copy operation for a cache structure of the shared storage processor is initiated. Although the cache structure is owned by an exploiter of the cache structure, one or more objects of the cache structure are copied via an operating system of the computing environment. The one or more objects are copied from the cache structure to another cache structure of the computing environment. Both cache structures may be located within the same shared storage processor or within different shared storage processors.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 23, 1999
    Date of Patent: April 8, 2003
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David A. Elko, Jeffrey M. Nick, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Ruth A. Allen, Mark A. Brooks
  • Patent number: 6330612
    Abstract: A method and apparatus for serializing access by n entities to a shared resource in an information handling system. A waiter list is defined as a circular list of n bits, each of which is assigned to an entity. When a bit is false (0) it indicates that the corresponding entity is not waiting for the lock; when the bit is true (1) it indicates the corresponding entity is waiting for the lock. A next waiter indicator (NWI) is also defined that contains a value from 0 to n inclusive; a value of 0 indicates that there are currently no waiters, while a value from 1 to n indicates the next waiter to whom the lock will be granted. The waiter list is initialized to zeros to indicate there are no waiters. When an entity requests a lock that cannot be granted, the entity is made a waiter by setting the corresponding bit in the waiter list to one. If the next waiter indicator is zero, indicating that there were previously no waiters for the lock, the indicator is set to identify the requesting entity as the next waiter.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 28, 1998
    Date of Patent: December 11, 2001
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Mark A. Boonie, Peter G. Sutton, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Phil Chi-Chung Yeh
  • Patent number: 6317744
    Abstract: Fully-associative non-linear collections of items are browsed. At least a portion of a fully-associative non-linear collection of items is segmented into a plurality of segments. This segmenting is transparent to any browsers of the fully-associative non-linear collection of items. The plurality of segments is then browsed by multiple browsers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 23, 1999
    Date of Patent: November 13, 2001
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David A. Elko, Jeffrey M. Nick, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6253274
    Abstract: In a network computing environment having a plurality of central processing units, a high performance locking facility coupled to said plurality of central processing units comprising: a processing means for processing multiple requests for locking operations simultaneously and a lock table for creating entries including lock names and lock states. A high-speed searching mechanism for searching any particular lock entry in the table is also provided, as well as means for altering and modifying said table accordingly depending upon any lock status that is being processed. Finally a response and status generator is provided for providing an appropriate response and status of any lock state to other requestors requesting a particular lock.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 28, 1998
    Date of Patent: June 26, 2001
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Mark A. Boonie, Jeffrey M. Nick, Peter G. Sutton, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Phil C. Yeh
  • Patent number: 6230243
    Abstract: Changed data of castout classes of a coupling facility cache are managed in order to be able to efficiently determine the age of the oldest changed data in the cache. A directory entry representing a changed datum is placed in a data structure corresponding to the castout class of the changed datum. The data structure includes an order queue ordered by timestamps and a process queue, having an ordered portion and an unordered portion. When the directory entry is to be added to the data structure, an attempt is first made to place the entry on the order queue. If the entry is not placed on the order queue within a predefined amount of time, then the entry is placed on the process queue, the order of which is maintained by background tasks. In order to return the oldest entry of the data structure, the smallest entry of the process queue is determined and that entry is then compared to the smallest entry of the order queue. The smaller of those two entries corresponds to the oldest entry for the castout class.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 19, 1999
    Date of Patent: May 8, 2001
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David Arlen Elko, Jeffrey W. Josten, Jeffrey M. Nick, David H. Surman, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 6189007
    Abstract: A method and apparatus of assigning and releasing locks, in a network computing environment having a plurality of central processing units coupled to a high performance locking facility. The method comprises of the steps of first receiving and processing a lock operation synchronous to any requesting central processor unit requesting a lock and then recording lock names and lock states in entry records of a lock table based on the requests. When a request is being processed, providing high-speed searching to search any particular lock entry in the table and altering and modifying the table accordingly. Finally an appropriate response and the status of the lock state will be generated and sent to other requesters requesting the lock.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 28, 1998
    Date of Patent: February 13, 2001
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Mark A. Boonie, Jeffrey M. Nick, Peter G. Sutton, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Phil C. Yeh
  • Patent number: 6185650
    Abstract: A method of assigning and releasing locks, in a network computing environment having a plurality of central processing units coupled to a high performance locking facility. The method comprises of the steps of first processing multiple requests for locking operations simultaneously and then recording lock names and lock states in entry records of a lock table based on the requests. When a request is being processed, providing high-speed searching to search any particular lock entry in the table and altering and modifying the table accordingly. Finally an appropriate response and the status of the lock state will be generated and sent to other requestors requesting the lock.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 28, 1998
    Date of Patent: February 6, 2001
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Mark A. Boonie, Jeffrey M. Nick, Peter G. Sutton, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Phil C. Yeh
  • Patent number: 6088757
    Abstract: The present invention provides for a computer program product and device including instructions executable by a digital processing apparatus for conducting a high-performance locking facility. At first multiple requests for locking operations are processed and received simultaneously and their lock names and lock states are recorded in entry records of a lock table based on the requests. Next high-speed searching of any particular lock entry in this table is performed followed. The table can be altered and modified at this time as well accordingly depending upon lock status that is being processed. Finally an appropriate response is generated and the status of the lock state is provided to those requesting the lock.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 28, 1998
    Date of Patent: July 11, 2000
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Mark A. Boonie, Jeffrey M. Nick, Peter G. Sutton, Wendell W. Wilkinson, Phil C. Yeh
  • Patent number: 5581737
    Abstract: A method and apparatus for optimizing a data structure of an external data storage facility shared by a plurality of data processing systems, the data structure being allocated by a first allocation command which includes first allocation parameters based on an amount of storage space in the external data storage facility assigned for creation of the data structure and a composition of the data structure, includes a device for determining values of the first allocation parameters, to thereby determine a first composition of the data structure, a device for determining an actual usage of the data structure, to thereby determine a second composition of the data structure, a device for comparing the first composition of the data structure with the second composition of the data structure, and a device for issuing, based on an output from the comparing device, a second allocation command having second allocation parameters, to the data structure for reallocation thereof.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 12, 1994
    Date of Patent: December 3, 1996
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Dennis J. Dahlen, David A. Elko, Audrey A. Helffrich, Richard P. King, Jeffrey M. Nick, Stewart L. Palmer, Wendell W. Wilkinson
  • Patent number: 5544345
    Abstract: A high-speed cache is shared by a plurality of independently-operating data systems in a multi-system data sharing complex. Each data system has access both to the high-speed cache and to lower-speed, upper-level storage for obtaining and storing data. Management logic in the shared high-speed cache is provided to meet the serialization and data coherency requirements of the data systems when sharing the high speed cache as a store-multiple cache in a multi-system environment.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 8, 1993
    Date of Patent: August 6, 1996
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Kelly S. Carpenter, Gerard M. Dearing, Jeffrey M. Nick, Jimmy P. Strickland, Michael D. Swanson, Wendell W. Wilkinson