The Jade File System.

File systems have long been the most important and most widely used form of shared permanent storage. File systems in traditional time-sharing systems such as Unix support a coherent sharing model for multiple users. Distributed file systems implement this sharing model in local area networks. However, most distributed file systems fail to scale from local area networks to an internet. This thesis recognizes four characteristics of scalability: size, wide area, autonomy, and heterogeneity. Owing to size and wide area, techniques such as broadcasting, central control, and central resources, which are widely adopted by local area network file systems, are not adequate for an internet file system. An internet file system must also support the notion of autonomy because an internet is made up by a collection of independent organizations. Finally, heterogeneity is the nature of an internet file system, not only because of its size, but also because of the autonomy of the organizations in an internet. This thesis introduces the Jade File System, which provides a uniform way to name and access files in the internet environment. Jade is a logical system that integrates a heterogeneous collection of existing file systems, where heterogeneous means that the underlying file systems support different file access protocols. Because of autonomy, Jade is designed under the restriction that the underlying file systems may not be modified. In order to avoid the complexity of maintaining an internet-wide, global name space, Jade permits each user to define a private name space. In Jade's design, we pay careful attention to avoiding unnecessary network messages between clients and file servers in order to achieve acceptable performance. Jade's name space supports two novel features: It allows multiple file systems to be mounted under one directory, and it permits one logical name space to mount other logical name spaces. A prototype of Jade has been implemented to examine and validate its design. The prototype consists of interfaces to the Unix File System, the Sun Network File System, and the File Transfer Protocol.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Computer Science

Grantor dc:publisher

The University of Arizona.

Year dc:date.issued

1991

Author dc:creator

• Rao, Herman Chung-Hwa.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Peterson, Larry

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Schlichting, Rochard
• Hudson, Scott

• File organization (Computer science)

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author.

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10150/185569

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:repository.arizona.edu:10150/185569