Renaissance: managing the network computer and its storage requirements

Abstract

The authors describe a set of solutions developed to address the storage management problem for networks of workstations and fileservers. Specifically, they describe the implementation of the Renaissance Infinite Storage Manager (ISM). Based on the bitfile client and bitfile server components of the IEEE Mass Storage Reference Model, the network ISM uses a mass storage server as backing store for magnetic disks attached to workstations and workgroup servers on a network. The ISM preserves the transparency of access while the contents of the least recently used storage on the network automatically migrate to the storage server. >