HP Assigned Two Patents

Maintaining commonly named client-specific file content
in HDD emulation

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, LP, Houston, TX, has been assigned a patent (8,332,370) developed by Yves Gattegno, La Haye les Roses, and Julien Rope, VilleJuif, France, for a "maintaining commonly named client-specific file content in HDD emulation."

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "A data processing network has a virtual hard drive emulator and client terminals that share a virtual disk image. Client-specific read-write versions of selected files or directories are supported. All clients access the client-specific versions using the same name and address identifiers (for example, the same file name for a given configuration file), but each client has an exclusive version. A file ID distinguishes respective clients. These files are maintained alongside other files of other types and attributes. The selection of files to be client-specific can be predetermined, or a client-specific version of a file can be generated if the client executes a write operation to a client-specific file or area, the written data containing data read by the client in any of memory area available to the clients (RAM, Virtual Disk Drive, HDD etc.). The technique supports customization while maximizing administrative control of OS versions and minimizing redundant storage. File access for client terminals can be made close to systems having local hard drives."

The patent application was filed on May 9, 2006 (11/382,304).

Measuring consistability of distributed storage system

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, LP, Houston, TX, has been assigned a patent (8,326,807) developed by five co-inventors for "methods of measuring consistability of a distributed storage system."

The co-inventors are Amitanand Aiyer, Austin, TX, Eric A. Anderson, Palo Alto, CA, Xiaozhou Li, Cupertino, CA, Mehul A. Shah, Saratoga, CA, and John Johnson Wylie, San Francisco, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "A method for measuring consistability of a distributed storage system is disclosed. The method includes determining at least one consistency level that the distributed storage system can provide. A plurality of failure classes can be determined for the distributed storage system. A probability of the distributed storage system to be in each of the plurality of failure classes can be measured. Each failure class can be mapped to the at least one consistency level. The probability of each failure class for each consistency level can be summed to determine an expected portion of time that the distributed storage system provides each consistency level."

The patent application was filed on Jan. 23, 2009 (12/359,190).