Appeal No. 97-4408
Application No. 08/579,314
This is a decision on appeal from the final rejection of
claims 18 through 39, all of the claims pending in the
application.
The invention pertains to failure-tolerant data storage
systems. More particularly, the invention employs data
storage units divided into logical groups with each group
including a reserved area for storing system information and
including an update table that contains various values
indicative of which logical groups of disk drives were being
synchronized when a power failure occurred.
Representative independent claim 18 is reproduced as
follows:
18. A redundant storage array system comprising:
a) a plurality of failure-independent data storage
units divided into at least two logical groups, more than
one of said data storage units in each logical group
including a reserved area for storing at least
system information, and including an update table for
storing at least a first value for indicating an
interruption in a process for updating and synchronizing the
reserved areas of the data storage units of the logical
groups;
b) a controller for completely updating the reserved
areas in a current logical group including said first
value for indicating an interruption in a process before
any updating may commence on the reserved areas within a
next logical group to ensure that the reserved areas of
either said current logical group or said next logical
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