Patent ID: 11874740

Abstract:
A clustered pair of storage systems configured for active-active bidirectional synchronous replication expose a stretched volume over paths to both storage systems. Writes to the stretched volume received at each system are replicated to the peer system. The cluster can use a time-to-live (TTL) mechanism by which a non-preferred system continuously requests a TTL grant from the preferred system to remain in the cluster. Algorithms that reduce or avoid data unavailability are described and can include assessing the health of the systems in the cluster. An unhealthy system can trigger a one-sided polarization algorithm to notify the peer system that it is polarization winner. An improved polarization technique using a witness to decide the polarization winner includes a system adding a time delay before contacting the witness if the system is unhealthy. A control component can detect an unhealthy system and disable the active-active bidirectional synchronous replication.