一种闪存敏感的多级缓存管理方法

基于闪存的固态硬盘(solid state driver,简称SSD)已经广泛应用于各种移动设备、PC机和服务器.与磁盘相比,尽管SSD具有数据存取速度高、抗震、低功耗等优良特性,但SSD自身也存在读写不对称、价格昂贵等不利因素,这使得SSD 短期内不会完全取代磁盘.将SSD和磁盘组合构建混合系统,可以发挥不同的硬件特性,提升系统性能.基于 MLC 型 SSD 和 SLC 型 SSD 之间的特性差异,提出了一种闪存敏感的多级缓存管理策略——FAMC.FAMC将SSD用在内存和磁盘之间作扩展缓存,针对数据库系统、文件管理中数据访问的特点,有选择地将内存牺牲页缓存到不同类型的SSD.FAMC同时考虑写请求模式和负载类型对系统性能的影响,设计实现对SSD友好的数据管理策略.此外,FAMC基于不同的数据置换代价提出了适用于SSD的缓冲区管理算法.基于多级缓存存储系统对FAMC的性能进行了评测,实验结果表明,FAMC可以大幅度降低系统响应时间,减少磁盘I/O.     

全程优化的固态硬盘垃圾回收方法

由于NAND闪存的固有限制,写前擦除和擦除粒度较大,基于NAND Flash的固态硬盘（SSD）需要执行垃圾回收以重用失效页。然而垃圾回收带来的高开销会显著降低SSD的性能,也会直接影响SSD的寿命。特别是对于频繁使用的有数据碎片的SSD,垃圾回收带来的性能下降问题将更为严重,现有的垃圾回收（GC）算法各自侧重垃圾回收操作的某个步骤,并没有给出全面考虑各步骤对整体影响的综合方案。针对该问题,在详细剖析垃圾回收过程的基础上,提出了一种全程优化的垃圾回收方法WPO-GC,在数据初始放置、垃圾回收目标块的选择、有效数据的迁移、触发回收的时间点以及中断处理方式上,尽可能全面地考虑各步骤对SSD正常读写请求和寿命的影响。通过开源模拟器SSDsim上的WPO-GC的有效性验证表明,同典型GC算法相比,WPO-GC可以减少SSD读请求延迟20%~40%和写请求延迟17%~40%,均衡磨损近30%。     

一种基于闪存的缓冲区管理算法

在大多数以磁盘为存储系统的操作系统中,缓冲区管理算法只考虑到了数据访问的命中率。然而,闪存的写操作代价远远大于读操作代价。为了提高闪存性能,本文提出的O CFLRU（Optimal CFLRU）算法对于CFLRU（Clean First LRU）算法做了优化。该算法用一种页 块混合的数据结构来分别管理缓冲区中的干净页面和脏的数据页面聚簇。当缓冲区空间不够时,优先置换干净页面,再置换出脏的数据页聚簇,从而减少了写回的次数和随机写带来的擦除次数,提高了闪存的性能。     

WAPFTL:支持预测机制的负载自适应闪存转换层算法

基于NAND Flash的固态盘凭借其低延迟、低功耗、高可靠性等优点,已经开始应用于企业级服务器和高性能计算领域。针对固态盘相对较差的写性能及使用寿命有限等不足,提出了一种闪存转换层中基于页映射机制的自适应地址映射算法WAPFTL。该算法能够在地址转换过程中预测负载读写特性并自适应地调整地址映射信息缓存的策略。实验结果表明,WAPFTL能够高效协同利用负载的时间局部性和空间局部性,提高地址映射命中率,减少因地址映射而引起的额外写操作次数;同时,有效减少了垃圾回收次数,提高了SSD整体性能。     

一种海量存储系统二级缓存的设计与实现

引入新颖固态存储技术和DRAM与固态硬盘（SSD）混合的缓存架构，提出一种海量存储系统的二级缓存策略，通过回写策略能够有效减少SSD缓存的小写问题，并对两级缓存架构下建立的逻辑磁盘进行测试，结果表明在请求平均响应时间上取得了优化。     

基于数据更新间隔的NAND闪存垃圾回收算法

闪存因具有速度快、体积小等优点而广泛应用于数据存储领域,为提高NAND闪存的垃圾回收效率、延长闪存使用寿命,提出一种基于数据更新间隔的垃圾回收算法UIGC。计算闪存中空闲页的分散度,将其作为垃圾回收触发条件。从垃圾回收效率和磨损均衡效果2个方面出发,综合考虑块中无效页年龄累计和以及块中有效页比例,使用动态回收块选择和静态回收块选择相结合的策略来选择目标回收块,根据回收块中有效页数据更新间隔判断有效页热度,同时提出数据更新稳定性的概念来划分有效页的数据更新状态,将具有不同热度和更新状态的有效页数据分别存储在不同的空闲块中,从而提高块中数据的同步更新概率。实验结果表明,UIGC算法相较于CAT、FaGC等现有垃圾回收算法具有更优的垃圾回收效率和磨损均衡效果,并能有效延长闪存使用寿命。     

基于连续缓存和二级缓存的DFTL改进算法

DFTL(demand-based FTL)是一种根据负载访问特点动态加载映射项到缓存中的知名FTL(flash translation layer)算法,但是它没有考虑到请求的空间局部性,而且缓存中的一个映射项剔除就可能会导致翻译页的更新,缓存中映射项的频繁剔除又会导致额外的擦除操作.在DFTL的基础上,提出了SDFTL(sequential/second cache DFTL)算法.SDFTL新设置连续缓存和二级缓存,连续缓存通过预取映射信息,利用请求的空间局部性,提高了FTL对连续负载的处理性能;二级缓存通过暂存从一级缓存中剔除的、发生更新的映射项,并采取批量更新策略回写到闪存,减少了闪存的翻译页写回次数和擦除次数.利用实际负载做的实验结果显示,SDFTL相比DFTL缓存命中率平均提高41.57%,擦除次数平均减少23.08%,响应时间平均减少17.74%.     

面向SSD/HDD混合存储的动态缓存调度算法DRC

云计算与大数据的发展,对存储系统的性能提出了越来越高的要求。这些系统中的任务具有高并发度特征,使得存储系统的数据访问呈现随机化。SSD具有优异的随机读写性能,但其写入次数受到限制,成本高昂,因此,基于SSD-HDD的混合系统成为存储技术发展的主要方向。面向SSD-HDD混合存储提出了一种基于动态替换代价的缓存调度算法(DRC),以请求中的热点数据以及替换数据的代价作为缓存替换依据,不仅有效地提高了缓存命中率,而且,通过减少磁盘随机写操作提升了系统的整体性能。实验结果表明,在高并发读写的场景下,DRC算法相对于LRU或FIFO算法缓存命中率提升可达11.6%,IO速度最多提升16.7%,在各种缓存大小条件下均取得了显著的性能提升。     

一种时间敏感的SSD和HDD高效混合存储模型

基于闪存的固态硬盘(Solid State Driver,SSD)已成为目前广泛使用的一种持久存储设备.但是由于闪存不对称的I/O特性以及价格因素,SSD还不能完全取代传统硬盘(Hard Disk Driver,HDD).因此,由SSD和HDD组成的混合存储系统逐步成为目前研究的重点.文中针对SSD和HDD混合存储问题,提出了一个时间敏感的混合存储模型用来有效地利用SSD.该模型把SSD和HDD作为同级的存储设备,结合数据页的访问次数以及访问热度实现对页面的准确分类和分配,即将读倾向负载的hot页面分配到SSD存储,写倾向负载的页面或者cold页面分配到HDD存储,从而利用SSD和HDD不对称的I/O特性来降低系统总的I/O延迟.作者分别在基于高端SSD和中端SSD的混合存储系统上实现了提出的混合存储模型,并进行了性能评测.实验结果显示,作者提出的模型可以实现对数据页更准确的分类,可以有效地降低页面迁移代价,在较少的SSD存储条件下取得了显著的性能提升.     

GC-RAIS:一种基于垃圾回收感知的固态盘阵列

垃圾回收操作会显著影响固态盘的性能,进而导致固态盘阵列的性能波动.为此,提出一种基于垃圾回收感知的磁盘阵列(GC-RAIS),充分利用固态盘的高随机读特性和固态盘阵列中的热备份盘,以减轻垃圾回收操作对固态盘阵列性能波动的负面影响.当固态盘阵列中某个固态盘正在处理垃圾回收操作时,对于到达该固态盘的读请求采用重构方式处理,即读取同一条带上其他固态盘上的数据重构得到,而对于到达该固态盘的写请求则将写数据临时存放在热备盘中,并更新相应的校验信息.当垃圾回收过程结束后,将被重定向的写数据写回到正确的固态盘中.仿真实验结果表明相对局部垃圾回收LGC策略和全局垃圾回收GGC策略,GC-RAIS分别减少用户I/O请求的平均响应时间达55％和25％.     

基于写数据页聚簇的固态硬盘缓冲算法

针对Flash写前需擦除,读写I／O开销不均衡等固有缺陷,研究面向闪存缓冲区管理,对提高基于Flash的固态硬盘（SolidState Disk,SSD）访问性能具有重要理论意义和应用价值．通过分析SSD关键技术及现有缓冲区管理算法,实现了一种适用于SSD的基于写数据页聚簇缓冲算法．文章中详细介绍了该算法关键技术及原理,并通过FlashSim仿真平台实现SSD写缓冲．基于仿真结果与传统缓冲算法性能比对,分析得出该缓冲算法可降低SSD随机写次数和SSD数据存储分散性,并提升SSD响应速度．     

使用固态硬盘管理主存KV数据库的虚拟内存

主存键值(key-value,KV)数据库具有高效性、易用性和可扩展性.由于主存容量有限,一些数据量较大的应用必须使用磁盘进行数据交换.而固态硬盘(solid state disk,SSD)有高速的随机读特点,使用固态硬盘作为主存KV数据库的虚拟内存会提高对不在主存中的数据的读性能.但是固态硬盘的随机写性能较差,于是提...     

Exploiting flash memory characteristics to improve performance of RAIS storage systems

Redundant array of independent SSDs (RAIS) is generally based on the traditional RAID design and implementation. The random small write problem is a serious challenge of RAIS. Random small writes in parity-based RAIS systems generate significantly more pre-reads and writes which can degrade RAIS performance and shorten SSD lifetime. In order to overcome the well-known write-penalty problem in the parity-based RAID5 storage systems, several logging techniques such as Parity Logging and Data Logging have been put forward. However, these techniques are originally based on mechanical characteristics of the HDDs, which ignore the properties of the flash memory. In this article, we firstly propose RAISL, a flash-aware logging method that improves the small write performance of RAIS storage systems. RAISL writes new data instead of new data and pre-read data to the log SSD by making full use of the invalid pages on the SSD of RAIS. RAISL does not need to perform the pre-read operations so that the original characteristics of workloads are kept. Secondly, we propose AGCRL on the basis of RAISL to further boost performance. AGCRL combines RAISL with access characteristic to guide read and write cost regulation to improve the performance of RAIS storage systems. Our experiments demonstrate that the RAISL significantly improves write performance and AGCRL improves both of write performance and read performance. AGCRL on average outperforms RAIS5 and RAISL by 39.15% and 16.59% respectively.     

Reducing SSD access latency via NAND flash program and erase suspension

In NAND flash memory, once a page program or block erase (P/E) command is issued to a NAND flash chip, the subsequent read requests have to wait until the time-consuming P/E operation to complete. Preliminary results show that the lengthy P/E operations increase the read latency by 2× on average. This increased read latency caused by the contention may significantly degrade the overall system performance. Inspired by the internal mechanism of NAND flash P/E algorithms, we propose in this paper a low-overhead P/E suspension scheme, which suspends the on-going P/E to service pending reads and resumes the suspended P/E afterwards. Having reads enjoy the highest priority, we further extend our approach by making writes be able to preempt the erase operations in order to improve the write latency performance. In our experiments, we simulate a realistic SSD model that adopts multi-chip/channel and evaluate both SLC and MLC NAND flash as storage materials of diverse performance. Experimental results show the proposed technique achieves a near-optimal performance on servicing read requests. The write latency is significantly reduced as well. Specifically, the read latency is reduced on average by 46.5% compared to RPS (Read Priority Scheduling) and when using write–suspend–erase the write latency is reduced by 13.6% relative to FIFO.     

基于代价的闪存数据库缓冲区置换算法

提出一种基于闪存硬盘(solid state disk,简称SSD)的自适应缓冲区管理算法CBLRU,其将数据页的置换代价与其驻留内存的影响相结合,为每个数据页附加一个权值,当发生页缺失问题时,选择具有最小权值的数据页进行置换,从而可以在延长修改页驻留缓冲区的同时,避免某些修改页长期占用缓冲区中有效空间问题的发生.由于...     

基于逻辑区间热度的NAND闪存垃圾回收算法

针对现有的NAND闪存垃圾回收算法中回收性能不高,磨损均衡效果差,并且算法内存开销大的问题,提出了一种基于逻辑区间热度的垃圾回收算法。该算法重新定义了热度计算公式,把连续逻辑地址的NAND内存定义为一个热度区间,以逻辑区间的热度来代替逻辑页的热度,并将不同热度的数据分开存储到不同擦除次数的闪存块上,有效地实现了数据冷热分离,并且节约了内存空间。同时,算法还构造了一种新的回收代价函数来选择回收块,在考虑回收效率的同时,还兼顾了磨损均衡的问题。实验结果表明,该算法与性能优异的FaGC算法相比,总的擦除次数减少了11%,总的拷贝次数减少了13%,擦次数最大差值减少了42%,内存消耗能减少了75%。因此,该算法有利于增加闪存可用空间,改善闪存系统的读写性能,延长闪存使用寿命。     

Uniform scheduling of interruptible garbage collection and request IO to improve performance and wear-leveling of SSDs

In the past ten years, solid-state drive (SSD) has become one of the mainstream storage devices due to its performance advantages. However, how to reduce the impact of garbage collection operations on host-side IO is still a challenging issue in SSD firmware design. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a uniform scheduling of interruptible garbage collection and host IO (USIGC). The main contributions of USIGC include: First, USIGC sets up an interruptible garbage collection sub-request queue, and then uniformly schedules this sub-request queue with the host IO queue. In this way, the idle time of each channel is fully utilized to complete valid page migration and erase operation of interrupt garbage collection. Second, USIGC predicts the probability that the erase operation can be completed in the current idle time based on the historical idle interval and then makes the erase operation decision to reduce the probability of blocking the host IO. Third, by converting the amount of data that can be written in future to the present and taking the number of invalid pages of the current block as the selection basis of the victim block, the garbage collection and wear-leveling can be unified. Experimental results show that, compared with existing works, USIGC can reduce the average response time and max wait time and achieve the best wear-leveling performance.

     

Study of the performance impact of a cache buffer in solid-state disks

An SSD generally has a small memory, called cache buffer, to increase its performance and the frequently accessed data are maintained in this cache buffer. These cached data must periodically write back to the NAND Flash memory to prevent the data loss due to sudden power-off, and it should immediately flush all dirty data items into a non-volatile storage media (i.e., NAND Flash memory), when receiving a flush command, while the flush command is supported in Serial ATA (SATA) and Serial Attached SCSI (SAS). Thus, a flush command is an important factor to give significant impact on SSD performance.In this paper, we have investigated the impact of a flush command on SSD performance and have conducted in-depth experiments with versatile workloads, using the modified FlashSim simulator. Our performance measurements using PC and server workloads provide several interesting conclusions. First, a cache buffer without a flush command could improve SSD performance as a cache buffer size increases, since more requested data could be handled in the cache buffer. Second, our experiments have revealed that a flush command might give a negative impact on SSD performance. The average response time per request with a flush command is getting worse compared to not supporting the flush command, as cache buffer size increases. Finally, we have proposed the backend flushing scheme to nullify the negative performance impact of the flush command. The backend flushing scheme first writes the requested data into a cache buffer and sends the acknowledgment of the request completion to a host system. Then, it writes back the data in the cache buffer to NAND Flash memory. Thus, the proposed scheme could improve SSD performance since it might reduce the number of the dirty data items in a cache buffer to write back to NAND Flash memory.All these results suggest that a flush command could give a negative impact on SSD performance and our proposed backend flushing scheme could improve the SSD performance while supporting a flush command.