Patent ID: 6718436
Filing Date: 2004-04-06
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
A method for managing a logical volume in order to support dynamic online resizing and minimizing a size of metadata, said method comprising steps of:a) creating the logical volume by gathering disk partitions in response to a request for creating the logical volume in a physical storage space; b) generating the metadata including information of the logical volume and the disk partitions forming the logical volume and storing the metadata to the disk partitions forming the logical volume; c) dynamically resizing the logical volume in response to a request for resizing, and modifying the metadata on the disk partitions forming the logical volume; and d) calculating and returning a physical address corresponding to a logical address of the logical volume by using mapping information of the metadata containing information of the physical address corresponding to the logical address; wherein the metadata includes, a disk partition table containing information of a disk partition in which the metadata is stored; a logical volume table for maintaining the information of the logical volume by storing duplicated information of the logical volume onto all disk partitions of the logical volume; an extent allocation table for indicating whether each extent in the disk partition is used or not used; and a mapping table for maintaining a mapping information for a physical address space corresponding to a logical address space which is a continuous address space equal in size of storage space to an entirety of said logical volume.