Claims
- 1. A computer system comprising:a. one or more central processing units; b. real storage linked to said one or more central processing units, said real storage comprising two or more reconfigurable storage entities, each of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities comprising one or more addressable entities, each of said one or more addressable entities having a first associated indicator indicating one of two associated status states, a first state or a second state, said first state being “non-preferred”, designating that the associated addressable entity should not contain fixed data, and said second state being “preferred”, designating that the associated addressable entity may contain fixed data; c. reconfiguration processing means for reconfiguring one of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities off-line, said reconfiguration processing means comprising means for copying contents of said one of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities to a second of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities; and d. reconfiguration enhancement means for increasing the likelihood of successful reconfiguration of said one of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities by said reconfiguration processing means, said reconfiguration enhancement means comprising identification means for identifying a damaged one of said addressable entities and a selected one of said addressable entities having a relation to said damaged one of said addressable entities, said damaged one and said selected one of said addressable entities residing in different reconfigurable storage entities; indicator means for indicating when “on” that said selected one of said one or more addressable entities be in said first, “non-preferred” state; and indicator adjustment means for turning “on” said indicator means in response to said identifying of said damaged one of said addressable entities by said identification means because of said relation between said damaged one of said addressable entities and said selected one of said addressable entities, wherein turning “on” said indicator means enhances probability of future successful reconfiguration of said one of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities by said reconfiguration processing means if said one of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities and said second of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities contain said damaged one of said addressable entities and said selected one of said addressable entities.
- 2. The system of claim 1 in which said reconfigurable storage entity is a storage subincrement, and in which said relation is a relationship of identical location of said damaged one and said selected one within respective reconfigurable storage entities.
- 3. The system of claim 2 in which each of two or more reconfigurable storage entities has a second associated indicator indicating one of two associated status states, a first status state or a second status state, said first status state being “non-preferred”, designating that the associated reconfigurable storage entity should not contain fixed data, and said second status state being “preferred”, designating that the associated reconfigurable storage entity may contain fixed data.
- 4. The system of claim 3 in which said indicator adjustment means further comprises reverse adjustment means for adjusting to “off” said indicator means for said selected one of said addressable entities to indicate that said selected one of said addressable entities need no longer be in said first state, when said damaged one of said addressable entities resides in said one of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities being reconfigured off-line.
- 5. The system of claim 4 further comprising table means for associating a total number of damaged addressable entities with each “on” indicator means.
- 6. The system of claim 5 in which said table means comprises a subincrement counter table and a subincrement image table.
- 7. The system of claim 3 further comprising storage convert means for obtaining additional storage which may contain fixed pages when required.
- 8. The system of claim 7 in which said storage convert means comprises:a. non-preferred reconfigurable storage entity convert means for converting a non-preferred reconfigurable storage entity to a preferred reconfigurable storage entity; and b. indicated addressable entity convert means for converting to a preferred addressable storage entity said selected one of said addressable storage entities having said indicator means “on” when no non-preferred reconfigurable storage entities exist.
- 9. The system of claim 8 in which said non-preferred reconfigurable storage entity convert means comprises initial selection means for selecting said non-preferred reconfigurable storage entity having a maximum number of said one or more damaged addressable entities for said converting.
- 10. The system of claim 9 in which said non-preferred reconfigurable storage entity convert means further comprises source adjustment means for adjusting all of said indicator means both in said reconfigurable storage entity selected by said initial selection means, and in all of said preferred reconfigurable storage entities, to reflect that said selected reconfigurable storage entity can no longer be a target, but can now be a source, for said copying by said reconfiguration means.
- 11. A method for enhancing the likelihood of successful off-line reconfiguration of one of two or more reconfigurable storage entities in a system comprising one or more central processing units, real storage linked to said one or more central processing units, said real storage comprising said two or more reconfigurable storage entities, each of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities comprising one or more addressable entities, each of said one or more addressable entities having at least two status states, a first state and a second state, said first state being “non-preferred”, designating that an associated addressable entity should not contain fixed data, and said second state being “preferred”, designating that the associated addressable entity may contain fixed data, and each of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities having at least two status states, a first status state being “non-preferred”, designating that an associated reconfigurable storage entity should not contain fixed data, and a second status state being “preferred”, designating that the associated reconfigurable storage entity may contain fixed data, said method comprising the steps of:a. detecting an uncorrectable storage error in a damaged one of said one or more addressable entities in a first of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities; b. locating a second of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities, said second of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities being a potential source entity for a storage reassign function between said second and said first of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities; c. locating a same relative addressable entity in said second of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities, said same relative addressable entity having a same relative position within said second of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities as has said damaged one of said one or more addressable entities within said first of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities, and d. turning on an indicator associated with said same relative addressable entity if said same relative addressable entity does not contain “fixed” data, said indicator indicating that said same relative addressable entity should not be used to contain fixed data.
- 12. The method of claim 11 further comprising the steps of:a. determining that an additional one or more of said addressable storage entities capable of containing fixed data are required; b. converting one of said reconfigurable storage entities from said first status state to said second status state if there is at least one of said reconfigurable storage entities in said first status state; and c. turning “off” said indicator associated with said same relative addressable entity so that said same relative addressable entity can contain fixed data, if there was not at least one of said reconfigurable storage entities in said first status state.
- 13. The method of claim 11 further comprising the steps of:a. reconfiguring said first of said two or more reconfigurable storage entities offline; and b. adjusting said indicator by turning said indicator off if no addressable entities in any of said reconfigurable storage entities remaining on-line, having said same relative position as said damaged one of said one or more addressable entities, have uncorrectable storage errors.
Parent Case Info
This application is a continuation, of application Ser. No. 08/029,641, filed Mar. 11, 1993, now abandoned.
US Referenced Citations (9)
Non-Patent Literature Citations (2)
Entry |
LY28-1442-2 “MVS/ESA Component Diagnosis & Logic: Command Processing” Part 2. |
IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin vol. 26, No. 7A, Dec. 1983 “Reconfiguration of Storage Elements to Improve Performance” by B.B. Moore, et al. pp. 3331-3332. |
Continuations (1)
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Number |
Date |
Country |
Parent |
08/029641 |
Mar 1993 |
US |
Child |
08/589826 |
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US |