Background Initialization for Protection Information Enabled Storage Volumes

摘要

Technology is disclosed for performing background initialization on protection information enabled storage volumes or drives. In some embodiments, a storage controller generates multiple I/O requests for stripe segments of each drive (e.g., disk) of multiple drives of a RAID-based system (e.g., RAID-based disk array). The I/O requests are then sorted for each of the drives according to a pre-determined arrangement and initiated in parallel to the disks while enforcing the pre-determined arrangement. Sorting and issuing the I/O requests in the manner described herein can, for example, reduce drive head movement resulting in faster storage subsystem initialization.

主权项

1. A computing device comprising:
a memory containing machine readable medium comprising machine executable code having stored thereon instructions for performing a method of performing background initialization on storage volumes of a storage array, the storage array including a plurality of storage drives; a processor coupled to the memory, the processor configured to execute the machine executable code to cause the processor to:
generate a plurality of read requests to stripe segments of each storage drive of the plurality of storage drives, wherein each storage drive includes a plurality of stripe segments, each of the stripe segments having a plurality of logical blocks that are contiguous within a given one of the stripe segments and non-contiguous from stripe segment to stripe segment;sort the read requests for each of the storage drives sequentially on a per-drive basis;initiate the read requests to each of the storage drives in parallel and sequentially within each storage drive; andinsert sequential protection information corresponding to the logical blocks after initiating the read requests.