JPH10320888A - High speed mounting system of carriable medium - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To increase the number of changing times per unit time by equipping plural optical disk drive devices, equipping an automatic charging cabinet with plural housing pockets and executing asymmetrically and parallel starting and stopping rotation of the drive device and changing optical disk cartridges in response to each command. SOLUTION: A rotation stopping request of drive 8 is issued by a host system 1 to one optical disk drive device(ODD) 5, and subsequently, a changing request of optical disk cartridges 13 is issued to the optical disk automatic charging cabinet (ACC) 9. The above requested operations are immediately and parallel executed by the ODD 5 and the ACC 9 respectively. One optical disk cartridge 13 taken out of an optical disk cartridge housing storage (cells) 12 is housed into the pocket #0 10 by the ACC 9, and is moved to the ODD 5, and also the other optical disk cartridge 13 collected in the pocket #1 11 is housed into the cells 12. In parallel with the above operations, starting rotation of the drive 8 is executed by the ODD 5.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method for exchanging portable media in a computer system, and more particularly, to an apparatus capable of storing a plurality of portable media in response to a continuous exchange request for a plurality of portable media. It relates to a method of mounting on a computer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Heretofore, in a device capable of automatically moving a portable medium from a storage to a drive using an automatic loading mechanism, a method of replacing the portable medium is such that the drive is already loaded in the drive and an access request is issued. When exchanging the portable medium (A) having no access and the portable medium (B) in the storage with a new access request, the automatic loading mechanism mounts the portable medium (A). The rotation operation of the driving device is temporarily stopped, and the portable medium (B) in the storage and the portable medium (A) in the driving device are exchanged by using an automatic loading mechanism. A series of operations for restarting the rotation operation of the mounted driving device has been realized by one operation of the automatic loading mechanism.

According to Japanese Patent Publication No. 07-48275,
When an access request is made from a plurality of terminals to an already mounted optical disk cartridge, the access request is stored in the information storage unit, so that even if access to the same optical disk cartridge conflicts, it is kept waiting. There is no method.

[0004]

In the above-mentioned prior art system, the performance for a plurality of access requests is considered for a portable medium that is already mounted, but another portable medium that is not mounted is considered. No consideration is given to the performance of accessing the medium.

[0005] In addition, in response to the exchange request for the exchange processing of the portable medium, the automatic loading mechanism manages the stop and start of the rotation operation of the driving device when the exchange processing is being performed. There is a problem that the replacement process cannot be executed until the start of the rotation operation of the drive device is completed.

[0006] It is an object of the present invention to provide a high-speed request for exchanging a plurality of portable media.

[0007]

In order to achieve the above object, a high-speed portable medium exchange method according to the present invention is configured as follows.

An apparatus for storing a plurality of portable media and automatically mounting or demounting the media by an automatic loading mechanism has a plurality of driving devices for inputting / outputting the portable media. The driving device has a mechanism for controlling the start and stop of the rotation operation, and stores the portable medium in the automatic loading mechanism for moving the portable medium from the storage to the driving device or from the driving device to the storage. A plurality of storages are provided, and a command for requesting start and stop of the rotation operation of the drive device and a command for requesting replacement of the portable medium by the automatic loading mechanism are provided, and each request is asynchronous and parallel. By executing this, a high-speed exchange operation is realized in response to an exchange request for a plurality of portable media.

[0009]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention. A host system 1 (hereinafter, referred to as a host) receives an optical disk library device 3 (hereinafter, referred to as an OLU) via an optical disk control device 2 (hereinafter, referred to as an ODC). Is shown. The OLU 3 includes an optical disk string controller 4 (hereinafter, referred to as OSC), an optical disk driving device 5 (hereinafter, referred to as ODD), an automatic optical disk loading mechanism 9 (hereinafter, referred to as ACC), an optical disk cartridge storage 12 (hereinafter, referred to as a cell), and a cell. It is constituted by a plurality of optical disk cartridges 13 stored therein.

Also, the optical disk cartridge in the ACC 9 is stored and ODD5 is stored in the cell, and cell 1 is stored in the ODD5.
Pocket 1 for storing optical disk cartridge 15 in 3
0 and a pocket 11, a rotation start mechanism 6 and a rotation stop mechanism 7 in the ODD. The rotation start mechanism 6 and the rotation stop mechanism 7 allow the host 1 to immediately start or stop the rotation of the optical disk cartridge in the drive 8 in response to a request to start and stop the rotation of the drive 8. Pocket 10 and pocket 11
Stores an optical disk cartridge for which an access request has been made and a used optical disk cartridge in order to exchange optical disk cartridges, and enables simultaneous movement of two optical disk cartridges with a single exchange request.

FIG. 2 shows a process for exchanging an optical disk cartridge in a drive with an optical disk cartridge in a cell from the host to the ODD. First, the host issues a request 21 to immediately stop the optical disk cartridge rotating operation of the drive. The host makes a request 22 to exchange / start the optical disk cartridge without waiting for the rotation operation of the drive to completely stop. The request 21 for stopping the rotation operation of the drive is executed by the ODD, and the request 22 for exchanging the optical disk cartridge is executed by the ACC, so that the respective requests can be executed in parallel. The ACC waits for the drive to stop, and when the drive stops, replaces the optical disk cartridge with the ACC. When the replacement of the optical disk cartridge is completed, the rotation operation of the replaced drive is started. While the rotation operation is being started, the replaced unused cartridge is returned to the cell. Since the operation of returning the cartridge to the cell and the activation of the rotation operation are operations of the ACC and the drive, respectively, they can be executed in parallel. Thereafter, a request 23 for confirming the completion of the drive activation is made. If the start-up of the drive is not completed correctly, a request 24 is issued to start the rotational operation of the drive. Since the request for exchanging the optical disk cartridge is also executed by the ACC, the requests can be executed in parallel. Therefore, it is possible to accept a mount request for another drive. The request for starting and stopping the rotation operation is sequentially performed for the same drive, but can be performed in parallel for different drives. Therefore, even while a certain drive is making a request to start or stop the rotation operation, another drive can make a request to start or stop the rotation operation.

FIG. 3 shows an ACC in which the optical disk cartridge mounted on ODD # 0 is replaced with the optical disk cartridge of cell # 45, and the optical disk cartridge mounted on ODD # 1 is subsequently replaced with the optical disk cartridge of cell # 44. It is a figure showing operation. ODD
In order to replace the optical disk cartridge mounted on # 0 with the optical disk cartridge stored in cell # 45, the stop of the rotation operation of the ODD is requested (31), and at the same time, the optical disk cartridge of cell # 45 is used by ACC. It is stored (32) in the pocket # 0 and moved to the ODD. At the same time as the rotation of the ODD is stopped, the ACC stores the optical disk cartridge in the ODD whose rotation has been stopped in the pocket # 1 (33), and stores the optical disk cartridge stored in the pocket # 0 in the ODD (3).
4) Yes. The optical disk cartridge in the pocket # 1 is transported to the cell # 46 and stored (35). Thereafter, the rotation operation of the ODD is started (36), and an access request can be made. Although the ACC cannot simultaneously execute an operation for a plurality of exchange requests, a start or stop request for the rotation operation of the ODD can be executed in parallel for each ODD. When a continuous access request is made in the OLU, the rotation operation of the ODD can be stopped (37) and started (36) at the same time, and the time until the access request after the exchange request can be shortened. It is.

[0014]

According to the present invention, a portable medium in an apparatus for automatically mounting or demounting a medium by an automatic loading mechanism in a computer system can be used for an online search operation in which a continuous exchange request occurs. When used, it has the effect of increasing the number of replacements per unit time.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart of a processing example for controlling by a host system in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an operation in the optical disk library device.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Host system, 2 ... Optical disk control apparatus, 3 ... Optical disk library apparatus, 4 ... Optical disk string controller, 5 ... Optical disk drive,
6: rotation start mechanism, 7: rotation stop mechanism, 8: drive, 9: optical disk automatic loading mechanism, 10: pocket # 0, 11: pocket # 1, 12: optical disk cartridge storage, 13: optical disk cartridge.

Claims (2)

[Claims] An apparatus for storing a plurality of portable media and automatically mounting or demounting the media by an automatic loading mechanism has a rotation start mechanism and a rotation stop mechanism in response to a plurality of portable medium replacement requests. The request is to be divided into a request to start the rotation operation of the driving device during mounting or a request to stop the driving device during demounting, and a request to move the portable medium by the automatic loading mechanism, and execute each request asynchronously and in parallel. A high-speed mounting method for portable media, in which a request for exchanging portable media to a plurality of drive devices is made at high speed. 2. An apparatus having a mechanism for simultaneously transporting a portable medium to be mounted on an automatic loading mechanism in response to a replacement request and a portable medium to be demounted in response to a request for replacement of a plurality of portable media. A request for starting the rotation operation or a request for stopping the driving device at the time of demounting and a request for moving the portable medium by the automatic loading mechanism are performed, and each request is executed asynchronously and in parallel, so that a plurality of driving devices can be controlled. A high-speed mounting method for portable media that requests replacement of portable media at high speed.