Abstract:
The present document is directed to data backup and data archiving and data synching and data sharing over disparate networks for the purpose of allowing private and commercial computing device users to back up, archive, synchronize and share data, including data files, on remote data-storage facilities via a network-based application. In particular, the teachings of the present document facilitate the end to end process through the utilization of a resilient data node without compromising the system itself, or the data stored therein security or privacy.

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION 
       [0001]    This application claims the benefit of Provisional Application No. 61/708,380, filed Oct. 1, 2012. 
     
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0002]    With an ever-increasing number of computing devices attaching to networks, each with an ever-increasing data storage capacity, more and more data is being created and consumed at the edge of the network. While the direct network connectivity of these computing devices has been able to keep up from a bandwidth-requirement perspective based on the needs of a single computing device connection, shared connections, such as those within a home office or remote branch office of a company, have not. 
         [0003]    In most corporate environments, data is critical to the needs of the organization, and historically there would a single computing device at the edge of the corporate network that was shared between multiple users. There was little, if any, local data storage and the network connectivity between these shared devices and the server-based systems to which they connected were more than adequate. Today&#39;s, and, increasingly, tomorrow&#39;s environment has totally flipped this model of computing on its head. Instead of a single computing device that is shared between multiple people, each person regularly has multiple personal computing devices each with its own large capacity of local data storage. In this new model, data is more often created and consumed at the edge of the network, with minimal operational oversight or control by centralized IT administration. 
       SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
       [0004]    The present document is directed to data backup and data archiving and data synching and data sharing over disparate networks for the purpose of allowing private and commercial computing device users to back up, archive, synchronize and share data, including data files, on remote data-storage facilities via a network-based application. In particular, the teachings of the present document facilitate the end to end process through the utilization of a resilient data node without compromising the system itself, or the data stored therein security or privacy. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0005]      FIG. 1  illustrates a single network site that connects multiple computing devices through a shared WAN connection to application server used for the backup, archiving, synchronization and sharing of data. 
           [0006]      FIG. 2  illustrates a single network site that adds a single resilient data node onto the high speed LAN for the purposes of data caching and performing time shift bandwidth utilization of the shared WAN connection. 
           [0007]      FIG. 3  illustrates multiple network sites each with their own resilient data node and sharing a common WAN to the application server. 
           [0008]      FIG. 4  illustrates a single network site that contains multiple, cooperating resilient data nodes on the high speed LAN for the purposes of data caching and performing time shift bandwidth utilization of the shared WAN connection. 
           [0009]      FIG. 5  illustrates how a resilient data node can be utilized at one location and then physically transported to another location. 
           [0010]      FIG. 6  illustrates the transparent roaming feature of the computing devices; they can dynamically roam between resilient data nodes and the application server without IT or end user intervention. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
       [0011]    In order to protect the data at the edge of the network,  FIG. 1  illustrates a typical deployment of an overall system that encompasses an application server  101  providing a set of network-based application services for data backup and data archiving and data synchronization and data sharing that exposes its services over a network  102  (the networks in the enclosed Figures could represent the Internet or any other public and/or private network topology and configuration). A remote branch office site  104  usually contains a high-speed Ethernet local area network (LAN) switch  105  that connects via a low bandwidth network connection  103  to the wide area network (WAN)  102  at significantly slower speeds than it provides to the computing devices resident on the LAN switch  105 . Agents are loaded on to each computing device such as a PC  107  or a laptop  106  and will consume the set of network-based application services exposed by the application server  101 . Wireless devices, such as tablets  110  or smartphones  111 , will connect to the LAN network via a wireless connection  109  to a Wireless Access Point  108  that in turn is connected to the LAN switch  105 . Wireless devices could also connect to the network via mobile data access points using protocols such as 3G/4G/LTE/CDMA etc. but these are not shown in the diagram. 
         [0012]    In such a configuration, the data traffic between the computing devices  107   106   110  and the application server  101  passes through the speed limited, shared low bandwidth connection  103 . Even with a relatively small number of computing devices, the network connection  103  is easily swamped by the data traffic needing to pass back and forth. The teachings of the present document, illustrated in  FIG. 2 , solve this issue by implementing a resilient data node locally on the high speed LAN to cache the data on the LAN, while addressing the bandwidth utilization pressure on the low bandwidth network connection  103 . 
         [0013]    The resilient data node, in order to help address the IT administration burden of distributed data management, can be centrally managed through a single interface without the need to administer the resilient data node directly. Through this interface, you can do things such as:
       Viewing status such as current speeds and queue lengths   Alerts for levels of disk space, queue length, queue age etc.   Managing bandwidth policy and the speeds to use at various times of the day   Controlling state, including taking the resilient data note offline for computing device use while still uploading, or taking offline and handling restores when blocks are only on an offline resilient data node.
 
As illustrated in  FIG. 1 , a remote network site  104  that needs to connect to Web-Service-based data backup and data archiving and data synchronization and data sharing functionality will quickly overwhelm a shared low bandwidth network connection  103 . Agents that are loaded onto computing devices  107  and  106  are sending their data over this shared low bandwidth connection. The data that is sent between the agents and the network-based application service is categorized as either management metadata or the actual data itself and in most cases, the data itself represents much of the bandwidth that is consumed across the network connection.
       
 
         [0018]    An example of a resilient data node is illustrated in  FIG. 2 , where a resilient data node  213  is added to the high speed LAN via the Ethernet switch  205 . The resilient data node  213  exposes its functionality over Web-Service-based interface, providing a high-speed cache on the LAN  205  for data that needs to be sent to, or come from the application server  201 . 
         [0019]    An agent on the computing device  206  continues to communicate with the application server  201  and/or resilient data node  213  for its management metadata, however the actual data will now flow to the resilient data node  213  instead of directly to the application server  201 . The connectivity between the computing devices  206   207   210  and the resilient data node  213  now travels over a high-speed LAN switch  205 , so the movement of data to and from the computing devices  206   207   210  completes significantly faster. With the agents on the computing devices no longer utilizing the low bandwidth network connection  203  for its data transfer, a centralized policy that documents the aggregate bandwidth to use by time period can be applied to the resilient data node  213  for its use of the low bandwidth network connection  203  so no matter how many computing devices exist within the LAN site  204 . 
         [0020]    Computing devices now process their data locally and perform any client side data de-duplication based on its management metadata communication with the application server  201  and/or resilient data node  213 . Any data flagged to be unique and requiring to be uploaded are sent via network-based application service protocols to the resilient data node  213  for later transport to the application server  201  based to the data transfer policy to the LAN site  204 . Once the data has been uploaded to the resilient data node  213 , it informs the application server  201  that it put the data on the resilient data node  213  and it is transferred at a later time. By enabling the management metadata to come from the resilient data node, advanced scenarios are enabled, including the ability to support the network site  204  after losing connectivity to the application server  201  by enabling data processing to continue offline, being brought back into synchronization once connectivity is restored. It also enables the resilient-data-node optimization. 
         [0021]    This data can still be globally de-duplicated against even though it hasn&#39;t made it completely to the application server  201  yet. Today, a computing device de-duplicates the data it needs to upload with itself (i.e. has it ever seen this data before) and then asks the application server  201  if it has ever seen any of the data it intends to upload before, thereby ensuring that only unique data travels over the network. The teachings of the present document add a de-duplication layer between these by enabling the computing device to first check with itself, then check with the resilient data node  213  to see if any of the data has been seen within that network site  204  before, and only then ask the application server  201 . 
         [0022]    Because data could be spread across multiple resilient data nodes before finally making its way to the application server, data may be needed by the application server before it has been uploaded.  FIG. 3  illustrates one implementation where there are a number of network sites  304   308   312 , each of which have a resilient data node  305   310   314  respectively, servicing LAN attached computing devices. A prioritized queue system is used to control data flow through the system. Each resilient data node maintains multiple queues of data for transport, with each queue assigned a priority for transport. In the illustration in  FIG. 3 , each resilient data node  305   310   314  is assigned a regular transport queue  307   309   313  respectively, as well as a high priority queue  306   311   315  respectively. Different bandwidth utilization policies can be applied based on the queue priority. 
         [0023]    The teachings of the current application support client side data de-duplication at the computing device level, but enhances this to support network site caching of de-duplicated data within a given network site. A computing device at site  312  uploads data to the resilient data node  314  that places the data in the normal queue  313  for eventual upload to the application server  301  according to the bandwidth policy for the site  312 . A computing device at site  304  uploads the same data to the resilient data node  305  that places the data in the normal queue  307  for eventual upload to the application server  301  according to the bandwidth policy for site  304 . Note that even though the same data has been uploaded to different resilient data nodes, only one copy of the data will actual be uploaded from either queue  313  or  307 . Before data is uploaded from the queues, the application server  301  will inform the resilient data node  305  that another resilient data node  314  has already uploaded the data and so don&#39;t bother uploading it again. This continues to deliver the data de-duplication efficiency of the existing solution by only moving the data once over the any low speed bandwidth connection, while delivering rapid data availability by caching the data on the LAN. 
         [0024]    The system itself is multi-tenant, and the data can be deduplicated across multiple tenants that in turn use resilient data nodes. The deduplication performed at the resilient data node level is scoped to the tenant level to make sure that if another tenants resilient data node hold the original data and it never makes it to the application server  301  that the tenant it protected. In other words, the system is resilient against the failure of other tenants in a multi-tenanted solution. 
         [0025]    The teachings of the current application support just-in-time access to data when needed, even if that data has not made it to the application server  301  yet. A computing device at networking site  308  can make a request for data to the resilient data node  310  (rather than going direct to the application server  301  if a resilient data node was not available). The resilient data node  310  will provide the elements of the data requested from its local cache. Any data that is needed that does not exist in its local cache is requested from the application server  301 . The application server  301  will immediately begin providing the data that has already been uploaded to it, but some of the data needed may still be in a queue on one of the resilient data nodes  305  in one of the other network sites  304  to move the data needed from the normal priority queue  307 , into a higher priority queue  306 . The data is now be uploaded according to the high priority bandwidth policy in order to fulfil the original request from the resilient data node  310 . Once the data is downloaded to the resilient data node  310 , it is provided to the original computing device that requested it. 
         [0026]    The computing device does not need to remain connected to the resilient data node  310  until the data is downloaded. It can disconnect from the network and the resilient data node  310  can continue to retrieve the needed data so that it is available the next time the computing device connects. 
         [0027]    A second implementation is also shown in  FIG. 3 , where instead of queues existing on the resilient data nodes  305   310   314 , there is instead a single prioritized queue for each resilient data node  305   310   314  maintained on the application server  301 , being  316   317   318  respectively. The resilient data nodes become much simpler in this implementation because, instead of having to track state, they simply ask the application server what work should they do now and after that has been performed; they then fetch their next item of work to perform. Not having state maintained on the resilient data node itself makes the system itself more resilient because the exact state of the resilient data node is always known and so the system can recover after a node failure or loss by instructing the computing devices that had data on that resilient data node to send the data that was still pending upload to an alternate resilient data node. 
         [0028]    As illustrated in  FIG. 4 , a larger network site  404  may need multiple resilient data nodes  408   409   410  that provide the services of a single resilient data node in cooperation. A given computing device  405  can be assigned through policy from the application server  401  to always use resilient data node  408  if it can see it on the network. A different computing device  406  may not have an associated default resilient data node on this network site  404 . Without a default resilient data node to use on the network site, the computing device  406  is assigned to one of the available resilient data nodes  408   409   410  on the network site  404  based on the best resource utilization across the resilient data nodes. 
         [0029]    With the large amount of data being produced and consumed at the edge of the network, it is possible that the low bandwidth network connection will not be able to transport the needed data within a reasonable period of time. One aspect of the teachings of the present document is illustrated in  FIG. 5  where resilient data nodes can be physically transported between sites. A new network site  510  is being deployed to utilize the application server  501 . Unfortunately this network site  510  only has an extremely low bandwidth connection  503  to the WAN  502 . Within the network site  510  itself, there is good internal connectivity via the LAN switch  504 . With the number of computing devices at this network site  510 , it is just not possible for the data to travel over the low bandwidth connection  503 . This may just an initial deployment issue as the incremental data that changes each day may be able to keep up based on the network speed and bandwidth policy assign to the network site  510  (that said, there is no reason that resilient data nodes could not be rotated in and out as needed). Computing devices  505   509  are configured to utilize a temporary resilient data node  508  in additional to a permanent resilient data node  507  to initially upload their data to. Once complete, this resilient data node  508  is disconnected from the network and put in a truck  511  for transport to the physical data center where the application server  501  is located. The resilient data node  508  is connected to the high speed network in the data center and its cached data is uploaded at high speed. The computing devices  505   509  are changed through policy to utilize only a single resilient data node  507  once the resilient data node  508  is disconnected from the network for physical transport. Security and privacy of the data on the resilient data node is not a concern for this kind of transport as each individual piece of data that resides on the resilient data node is encrypted with unique encryption keys for each individual piece of data. 
         [0030]    Physically transporting a resilient data node is just one method to help address low bandwidth network connectivity. Other methods include:
       Through policy, skip uploading some of the versions of files based on file type, specific computer device or other criteria. An example could be to only transport one version of an end users email archive file at the end of each day.   Add additional criteria to queue prioritization, such as deprioritizing a version of a file if a newer version is added to the queue to make sure you prioritize always getting the latest version to the application server.   Keep blocks on the resilient data node without ever uploading them to the application server so that they are available for local restores, only uploading them should they be requested.       
 
         [0034]    One implementation of the teachings of the present document is illustrated in  FIG. 6 , showing a computing device  602  that transparently roams between different private and public networks. The system is resilient to these network transitions for either uploading or downloading of data. For uploading to the application server  601 , the computing device  602  uploads directly according to the bandwidth policy for direct network connections. When the user roams to a new network site  604 , the computing device  602 ′ at this time detects the resilient data node  605  and begin uploading it data to it rather than directly to the application server  601 . When the user roams to a new network site  606 , the computing device  602 ″ at this time will detect the resilient data node  607  and begin uploading it data to it rather than to the resilient data node  605  or directly to the application server  601 . Before heading home, the computing device  602 ′″ is used from a public hotspot at a local coffee shop. The computing device  602 ′″ detects that there isn&#39;t a resilient data node to connect to and so transparently roams to talk directly to the application server  601 . These transitions are done transparently to the end user of the computing device. 
         [0035]    With uploading data, such resiliency is easier than the downloading of data because the caching facilities of the computing device  602  itself, along with those of resilient data nodes  605   607  when available, are always on the end user side of the low bandwidth connection, transportation of data occurs in the background, and the end user is generally not waiting for the data to upload. With downloading though, it is possible that most of the data needs to cross one or more low bandwidth connections, and the end user could have explicitly triggered the downloading of the data and so is generally watching and waiting for the data to arrive. The teachings of the current application support take a novel approach to addressing this issue and making the system resilient during this scenario also. Using  FIG. 6  again, the end user of computing device  602  requests a large restore of data from the application server  601  that may take several days to complete. Rather than an all-at-once approach, the application server will send a number of blocks of data down to the computing device  601  along with a potential back-off request for when the computing device  602  should request the next batch of blocks. This back-off mechanism provides a way to gracefully scale the system when the application server  601  is under load. When the end user roams to network site  604 , the computing device  602 ′ at this time will have missed its last batch request for blocks that it made to the application server  601 . Now the computing device  602 ′ makes this batch request for blocks to the resilient data node  605 , which in turn makes the request to the application server  601  for the blocks it does already have and returns them to the computing device  602 ′ along with a potential back-off request. This back-off request comes from when the resilient data node  605  is under load but also because the application server  601  may have asked the resilient data node  605  to back-off as well. When the end user roams to network site  606  then same process happens again where the computing device  602 ″ will have missed its last batch of blocks and so will start again by asking then resilient data node  607  for that batch. So as the end user roams, the system will continually deliver blocks of data down to the computing device according to bandwidth policy, network constraints and resource availability. On the computing device  602  itself, as enough blocks are available to restore a specific end user data file, then it is restored at that time. So even though the original complete restore of data may take several days, individual files begin to restore almost immediately and continue even between computing device reboots and roaming across different networks. 
         [0036]    Other scenarios that can be supported by the teachings of the present document are to support pre-emptive movement of data, the extraction of data for legal hold/e-discovery purposes, as well as on-premise restore for indexing, searching and analytics. An example of pre-emptive data movement is where a computing device that is usually located in one network site is temporarily relocated to a different network site for a short period of time before being relocated back again. Data that is uploaded to the resilient data node at the temporary location eventually makes its way to the application server. However, the system knows that a computing device at the original network site may eventually need the data and so it utilizes available bandwidth to download the data to the cache on the resilient data node of the original network site so that it is available without delay. 
         [0037]    For the legal hold/e-discovery scenario, a resilient data node could be populated with the data of the computing devices for the appropriate point in time. This resilient data node could then be physically transported to the lawyers and the data loaded and indexed into their e-discovery software. 
         [0038]    With the amount of data within a company it is hard to know what information is available, how it flows through an organization and any number of metrics about that data. Using the teachings of the present document, data could be sent to a resilient data node where it could be restored, indexed and made available through a search interface. Analytics could also ingest the data to be able to slice and dice the data for informational and trending analysis.