Hi, Steve:
With all those other operating systems, including Unix and Linux and
Windows, when you mmap() a file, you are mapping from a file system,
where a file resides somewhere on disk, into the private address space
of your job (or process).
With i5/OS. teraspace simulates a "private address space" in that each
job (MI process) has its own unique teraspace address space, so when you
mmap() a streamfile from the IFS, it does not directly reside on one
disk unit, but rather, it resides within the IFS portion of the "single
level storage" -- so the actual pages that comprise the streamfile may
be allocated on many different DASD devices, and i5/OS attempts to
"spread" them around, just like it does with any other object that
resides in single-level storage, in order to maximize the number of
heads and arms available to load the data "on demand" when needed, into
the real main storage "cache".
IBM does not support use of the mmap() API to map QSYS.LIB objects into
teraspace. I suppose this is because single-level storage MI objects are
"encapsulated" so you do not get direct access to their "internals",
only via supported interfaces and MI instructions, except for "space"
objects (e.g. *USRSPC)l, which is just an array of bytes (up to the 16
MB limit you like to talk about) that can be accessed directly via a MI
space pointer ( *SPCPTR).
SLS is a very different way of organizing data on one or more DASD
volumes. Consider that, above the MI layer, OS/400 or i5/OS is not
really even aware of "disk drives". It is all just "available space"
within the single-level storage, waiting to be allocated by one of the
various "create" MI instructions (to create the various kinds of MI
objects that reside within SLS.) In other words, the SLIC kernel is
aware of disk units, but then, once they are added to the System ASP, a
User ASP, or an Independent ASP, they become part of the single-level
storage. The rest of OS/400 or i5/OS "above the MI layer" (above the
SLIC kernel) is blissfully unaware of the existence of individual disk
units. This one design feature means that, unlike any other OS I am
aware of, you, as a user, never have to be concerned with allocating
files on certain disk volumes, or running out of space on one volume,
and so having to move files to a different disk unit, etc. -- all of
those issues just "go away" with SLS. And, in fact, in i5/OS or OS/400,
you cannot designate what disk volume to use when creating an object;
all you can do is to specify what ASP to create the object in (where the
object "resides" within single-level storage).
With multiple Independent ASPs, you really have several different
"single-level stores", one for the system ASP, and one for each
independent disk pool. You (temporarily) attach or "mount" a given
Independent ASP disk pool using the SETASPGRP command. This "mounts"
this IASP so it appears to be part of the SLS. This is roughly
analogous to mounting a disk unit in Unix or other operating systems,
thus making "visible" all of the objects that reside within that IASP.
Hope that helps,
Mark
> Steve Richter wrote:
I am not sure. I dont know enough about the memory mapping APIs in IBM
i, Unix and Windows. It does raise a larger question in my mind, which
is, if all operating systems can map memory to stream files, what is
special about SLS?
-Steve
On Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 9:02 PM, Mark S.
Waterbury<mark.s.waterbury@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi, Steve:
We already have the ability in OS/400 to use the UNIX mmap() API to map
any streamfile into teraspace. You can use mmap64() to map files larger
than 4GB into teraspace. This has been available almost since Teraspace
was first introduced (around V4R4).
Using this approach, you can directly address the contents of
streamfiles via pointers. Is this not what you are asking for? :-o
Mark S. Waterbury
> Steve Richter wrote:
when explaining SLS to those on another platform, keep in mind r that
you have to be prepared to make the case of how SLS is better than a
traditional system. In SLS you have the same way of addressing bytes
in a permanent user space as in program allocated memory. However,
there is the 16 meg segment size limit which complicates the work of
coding for spaces. We have teraspace, but teraspace can only be used
only for progam allocated memory.
Consider the improvements which could be made to SLS. Without the
segment limit, stream files could be addressed as an array of bytes.
No need for teraspace, since objects on the system could be the size
of all the dasd on the system. Program memory could be allocated from
permanent user space like objects, making it possible for the system
to store the complete program memory state of an abended job.
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