Lightweight appliance for content retrieval

摘要

In some embodiments, a request to retrieve a photograph is received. The request is interpreted and associated metadata for the requested photograph is retrieved. A determination is then made as to whether to retrieve the content of the photograph from either a multi-image container file or from a photo cache. The content of the photograph is then retrieved from the determined source. Finally, the content of the photograph and associated metadata are displayed on a display.

主权项

1. A method for lightweight retrieval of content, comprising:
receiving, at a server having an in-memory index, a request to retrieve a photograph from a storage system, wherein the photograph includes image content and the storage system is different and distinct from the sever; interpreting the request at the in-memory index, wherein the in-memory index identifies a hierarchical data structure associated with the request, the hierarchical data structure comprising metadata associated with the requested photograph; retrieving the metadata for the requested photograph, wherein the metadata resides on a solid state drive (“SSD”); identifying a source at the storage system, the source comprising one of a multi-image container file on a hard disk drive (“HDD”) and a photo cache on the SSD, wherein the multi-image container file has a system-wide fixed size based on a user behavior; determining an offset for the image content within the multi-image container file from the metadata, wherein the offset is associated with a node in the hierarchical data structure; retrieving the image content from the source; and displaying the image content and associated metadata on a display.