NetApp Assigned Two Patents

Creating environmental snapshots of storage device failure events
Netapp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,949,863) developed by Coatney, Doug, and Gavarre, Sharon, Sunnyvale, CA, for a “creating environmental snapshots of storage device failure events.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A storage device failure in a computer storage system can be analyzed by the storage system by examining relevant information about the storage device and its environment. Information about the storage device is collected in real-time and stored, this is an on-going process such that some information is continuously available. The information can include information relating to the storage device, such as input/output related information, and information relating to a storage shelf where the storage device is located, such as a status of adjacent storage devices on the shelf. All of the relevant information is analyzed to determine a reason for the storage device failure. Optionally, additional information may be collected and analyzed by the storage system to help determine the reason for the storage device failure. The analysis and supporting information can be stored in a log and/or presented to a storage system administrator to view.“

The patent application was filed on April 30, 2008 (12/112,427).

Computer program products providing change logging in deduplication process
Netapp, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,949,561) developed by Ramesh, Bharadwaj Vellore, Sunnyvale, CA, Challapalli, Venkata Vijay Chaitanya, San Jose, CA, Raghuwanshi, Rohini, Bangalore, India, Killamsetti, Praveen, Milpitas, CA, and Gupta, Sudhanshu, Bangalore, India, for a “systems, methods, and computer program products providing change logging in a deduplication process.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A method performed in a network storage system, the method including receiving a plurality of data blocks at a secondary storage subsystem from a primary storage subsystem, generating a first log that includes a first plurality of entries, one entry for each of the data blocks, in which each entry of the first plurality of entries includes a name for a respective data block and a fingerprint of the respective data block, receiving metadata at the secondary storage subsystem from the primary storage subsystem, the metadata describing relationships between the plurality of blocks and a plurality of files, generating a second log that includes a second plurality of entries, and merging the first log with the second log to generate a change log.“

The patent application was filed on August 7, 2012 (13/568,822).