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Chapter 1
1.1 Introduction
The High Performance Storage System (HPSS) is software that provides hierarchical storage
management and services for very large storage environments. HPSS may be of interest in
situations having present and future scalability requirements that are very demanding in terms of
total storage capacity, file sizes, data rates, number of objects stored, and numbers of users. HPSS
is part of an open, distributed environment based on OSF Distributed Computing Environment
(DCE) products that form the infrastructure of HPSS. HPSS is the result of a collaborative effort by
leading US Government supercomputer laboratories and industry to address very real, very urgent
high-end storage requirements. HPSS is offered commercially by IBM Worldwide Government
Industry, Houston, Texas.
HPSS provides scalable parallel storage systems for highly parallel computers as well as traditional
supercomputers and workstation clusters. Concentrating on meeting the high end of storage
system and data management requirements, HPSS is scalable and designed to store up to petabytes
15
(10
) of data and to use network-connected storage devices to transfer data at rates up to multiple
9
gigabytes (10
) per second.
HPSS provides a large degree of control for the customer site to manage their hierarchical storage
system. Using configuration information defined by the site, HPSS organizes storage devices into
multiple storage hierarchies. Based on policy information defined by the site and actual usage
information, data are then moved to the appropriate storage hierarchy and to appropriate levels in
the storage hierarchy.
1.2 HPSS Capabilities
A central technical goal of HPSS is to move large files between storage devices and parallel or
clustered computers at speeds many times faster than today's commercial storage system software
products, and to do this in a way that is more reliable and manageable than is possible with current
systems. In order to accomplish this goal, HPSS is designed and implemented based on the
concepts described in the following subsections.
1.2.1
Network-centered Architecture
The focus of HPSS is the network, not a single server processor as in conventional storage systems.
HPSS provides servers and movers that can be distributed across a high performance network to
HPSS Installation Guide
Release 4.5, Revision 2
HPSS Basics
September 2002
19
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