Abstract: If a monitor measurement cycle is set as a long cycle, promotion in a short cycle cannot be performed; and even if the number of I/Os is very large in response to fluctuations of the number of I/Os in several minutes to several hours of normal work, pages will be promoted after waiting for several weeks. As a result, I/Os which could have normally accepted by an upper tier will be accepted by a lower tier, which results in a problem of worsening the performance efficiency. A monitoring system capable of preventing demotion due to temporary reduction of the number of I/Os for specific pages from a viewpoint of a long cycle and enabling prompt promotion in response to an increase of the number of U/Os for 3 the specific pages is realized. A load index value defined from a viewpoint of a long cycle and a load index value defined from a viewpoint of a short cycle are updated based on the number of I/Os which is counted cyclically for each storage area.

Abstract: A path is formed between a host computer and storage apparatuses without depending on the configuration of the host computer and a network and a plurality of volumes having a copy function are migrated between storage apparatuses while keeping the latest data.

Abstract: A management target constituting the target of processing executed by a first storage system in accordance with a request transmitted from a higher-level device is managed by first and second management identifiers. A request designating the first management identifier is received from the higher-level device, and a first management identifier designated by the request is converted into a corresponding second management identifier.

Abstract: This invention provides a storage system to store data used by computers. A storage system coupled to a computer and a management apparatus, includes storage devices accessed by the computer and a control unit that controls the storage devices, in which the control unit performs the following operations: setting, in the storage devices, a first virtual device including a first logical device; setting a second virtual device which including a second logical device, which is a virtual volume accessed by the computer; allocating an address of the first logical device to the second logical device; and changing the allocation to change storage areas of the virtual volume.

Abstract: A computer system dynamically assigns the storage capacity from pool volumes to the access target in the higher-level system, and can immediately respond to the change of the status of the pool having the pool volumes. The control device provides a plurality of first pools, provides a second pool, allocates a storage area from one of the first pools to a logical area of the logical volume to store data to the logical area, and stores the data in the allocated storage area, adds at least one of the one or more pool volumes in the second pool to the first pool, according to the status of the first pool, and adds at least one pool volume provided by storage areas of at least one storage device to the second pool, according to the status of the second pool.

Abstract: Failures in a storage system are managed at low cost and with high reliability. A storage system is coupled to a file command issuing apparatus and a block command issuing apparatus, and processes commands from both. The storage system is provided with: a first control portion which is provided extending across a plurality of clusters and which is configured to control block access requests to a disk device; a plurality of second control portions which are configured to process file access requests and provided respectively in the clusters, and operate on virtual machines managed by a virtualization control portion; failure detecting portions which are configured to detect failures within each of the clusters; and a failure information management portion which is provided in the first control portion and which is configured to consolidate and manage failure information relating to failures detected by the failure detecting portions.

Abstract: The computer system, during the course of executing an operation of dynamically allocating a storage area to a virtual volume in response to an access from a host system, detects where a balance of a storage capacity among a plurality of logical areas is disrupted, and subsequently moves a storage area among a plurality of logical areas to maintain balance of the storage capacity.

Abstract: A plurality of storage apparatuses including a first and second storage apparatus, wherein said first storage apparatus is configured to have a first virtual volume composed of a plurality of virtual segments, at least said second storage apparatus is configured to have a pool composed of a plurality of real pages, each storage apparatus is configured to manage a virtual pool comprising one or more pools including at least said pool, said virtual pool is composed of a plurality of virtual pages, each virtual page corresponding to any real page, and said first storage apparatus is configured to receive a write command that specifies an address belonging to an unallocated virtual segment, allocate a free virtual page to said unallocated virtual segment, and write data to the real page corresponding to the allocated virtual page, even when said first storage apparatus does not have a pool composed of real pages.

Abstract: A computer system includes a first server computer, a second server computer, a nonvolatile memory device, and a storage controller connected to the first server computer and the second server computer via PCI-Express, and connected to the nonvolatile memory device. The storage controller provides a storage area in the nonvolatile memory device as a shared data area for the first server computer and the second server computer. A server computer, which is each of the first and second server computers, stores a program that issues an NVM-Express command that is a command conforming to an NVM-Express standard. The program instructs the server computer to access the shared data area via PCI-Express by instructing the server computer to issue the NVM-Express command that specifies a namespace associated with the shared data area.

Abstract: A first storage system comprises a first logical volume, and a first controller that has a first memory. A second storage system comprises a second physical storage device that constitutes the basis of a second logical volume and a journal area, and a second controller that has a second memory. At least the first memory stores a write unit size, which is the size of a write data element. The journal area is a storage area in which is stored a journal data element, which is a data element that is stored in any block of a plurality of blocks configuring the first and/or second logical volume, or a data element that is written to this block. The size of the journal data element, and the size of the respective blocks that are managed as the respective components of the first and second logical volumes are the write unit size.

Abstract: A storage system writes a data element stored in a primary volume to a secondary volume constituting a volume pair with the primary volume in accordance with a selected storage mode, which is a data storage mode selected from a plurality of types of data storage modes. This storage system is provided with a function for switching the above-mentioned selected storage mode from a currently selected data storage mode to a different type of data storage mode.

Abstract: A plurality of storage apparatuses including a first and second storage apparatus, wherein said first storage apparatus is configured to have a first virtual volume composed of a plurality of virtual segments, at least said second storage apparatus is configured to have a pool composed of a plurality of real pages, each storage apparatuses is configured to manage a virtual pool comprising one or more pools including at least said pool, said virtual pool is composed of a plurality of virtual pages, each virtual page corresponding to any real page, and said first storage apparatus is configured to receive a write command that specifies an address belonging to an unallocated virtual segment, allocate a free virtual page to said unallocated virtual segment, and write data to the real page corresponding to the allocated virtual page, even when said first storage apparatus does not have a pool composed of real pages.

Abstract: Provided are a computer system and its data control method that enable safe backup of data and reduction in the capacity of data to be backed up. A control processor refers to a differential and, if a differential bit is “0,” encrypts data of an online VOL with an encryption circuit by using key information, and transfers the encrypted data to a second storage system. If the differential bit is “1,” the control processor performs redundancy elimination processing to journal data, thereafter compresses the journal data with a compression circuit, encrypts the compressed journal data with an encryption circuit according to the key information, and transfers the journal data that was encrypted after compression to the second storage system.

Abstract: A shared device unit, which comprises a storage device, is coupled to a plurality of storage systems. The shared device unit provides a plurality of storage areas, which are based on the storage device, to the plurality of storage systems. Each storage system stores allocation management information which comprises an ID of a storage area provided to thereof among the plurality of storage areas, and provides the storage area corresponded to the ID included in the allocation management information to the host computer coupled thereto among the plurality of host computers.

Abstract: Proposes the realization of the performance stability operation of virtual volumes and the stabilized access performance for the virtual volumes in the storage apparatus. In the storage apparatus which configures a pool of multiple types of storage tiers of different performances, provides virtual volumes to the host computer and, in accordance with a write request from an application to a virtual volume, assigns pages to the relevant virtual volume from the pool, a policy associating an application with the virtual volume with which the relevant application reads/writes data, a storage tier to assign pages to the relevant virtual volume, and the priority of the relevant storage tier is managed and, in accordance with a write request from the application, complying with the corresponding policy, among the storage tiers associated with the corresponding virtual volume, pages are assigned from the storage tier of the higher priority to the relevant virtual volume.

Abstract: When a method for relocating data to a preferable storage area based on access frequency is applied to virtual machines, it takes a long time for determining volumes that are not accessed, and the access performance is deteriorated. The present invention provides a system and method in which a utilization status of a virtual machine is checked by the storage system, and pages used by virtual machines not being utilized are relocated promptly to lower tiers and pages used by virtual machines being utilized are relocated promptly to higher tiers, according to which the performance of the system is improved.

Abstract: Multiple storage area groups into which multiple storage areas provided by multiple storage devices are classified with reference to storage area attributes are managed. The multiple logical volumes to which, in accordance with a write request to at least one address included in multiple addresses in the logical volume, at least one storage area included in the multiple storage areas is allocated are provided. In accordance with the access condition of the at least one address in the logical volume, the data written to the at least one address by the write request is migrated from the at least one storage area included in one of the multiple storage area groups to at least one storage area in another storage area group included in the multiple storage area groups.

Abstract: A shared device unit, which comprises a storage device, is coupled to a plurality of storage systems. The shared device unit provides a plurality of storage areas, which are based on the storage device, to the plurality of storage systems. Each storage system stores allocation management information which comprises an ID of a storage area provided to thereof among the plurality of storage areas, and provides the storage area corresponded to the ID included in the allocation management information to the host computer coupled thereto among the plurality of host computers.

Abstract: A second storage maps a migration source volume to a virtual volume of a migration destination volume according to storage virtualization technology. A host system including a host switches an access path from an access path to the migration source volume to an access path to the migration destination volume. The second storage executes copy processing of migrating, from the migration source volume to the migration destination volume, data in an assigned area of a virtual volume according to thin provisioning of the migration source volume based on the information contained in the first thin provisioning information in the first storage, and copying that data from the migration destination volume to a virtual volume according to thin provisioning of a copy destination volume in the second storage. The second storage associates the virtual volume of the copy destination volume with the migration destination volume in substitute for the original virtual volume.

Abstract: When a method for relocating data to a preferable storage area based on access frequency is applied to virtual machines, it takes a long time for determining volumes that are not accessed, and the access performance is deteriorated. The present invention provides a system and method in which a utilization status of a virtual machine is checked by the storage system, and pages used by virtual machines not being utilized are relocated promptly to lower tiers and pages used by virtual machines being utilized are relocated promptly to higher tiers, according to which the performance of the system is improved.