Digital storage is now a part of our lives. However, storage management in legacy operating systems becomes quickly outmode due to swift advances in storage media (e.g., memory cards and thumb drives) and new user requirements (e.g., energy efficiency, security, etc.). In particular, legacy storage management presumes the use of disks rather than memory-based storage and is structured in layers with poor cross-layer coordination and little support for data-intensive applications. This project introduces tags?a unifying primitive that can be used to build storage layers. The idea is to tag each piece of data with how they relate to each other and how they are handled by each layer. Tags will ease storage service composition and data sharing. For example, file searches can be based on its association with e-mails and calendar events. Tags will ease the isolation of system changes required to adapt to new storage media. Tags describe the nature of data pieces (e.g., confidential, streaming media, etc.) so that storage layers can coordinate to improve performance, energy efficiency, etc. Tags will track data dependencies so that confidential data and derivatives (e.g., temporary files) can be handled securely. Intellectual merits: The challenges for this research include: (1) exploring the representation and interface of tags; (2) examining the management of tags under constraints of scaling, security, and assumptions of usage models and storage media; (3) developing ways to track data dependencies via tags; and (4) demonstrating the benefits of tags across diverse usage patterns and storage media. Broader impacts: Tags support data-intensive applications such as databases and search engines. The design of tags is similar to machine instructions and allows the application of hardware optimization techniques. The data-tracking service offered by tags will support secure storage services. The tag framework will become a valuable instructional tool, a platform to explore new ideas, and a gateway to explore ideas from other fields. The research will lead to the development of a seminar course on storage that emphasizes on infusing ideas from various fields to advance storage frontiers.
