Module 5: Recovery and Atomicity

 Failure Classification
 Storage Structure
 Recovery and Atomicity
 Log-Based Recovery
 Shadow Paging
 Recovery With Concurrent Transactions
 Buffer Management
 Failure with Loss of Nonvolatile Storage
 Advanced Recovery Techniques
 ARIES Recovery Algorithm
 Remote Backup Systems
 Failure Classification

 Transaction failure :
 Logical errors: transaction cannot complete due to some internal
error condition
 System errors: the database system must terminate an active
transaction due to an error condition (e.g., deadlock)
 System crash: a power failure or other hardware or software
failure causes the system to crash.
 Fail-stop assumption: non-volatile storage contents are assumed
to not be corrupted by system crash
 Database systems have numerous integrity checks to prevent
corruption of disk data
 Disk failure: a head crash or similar disk failure destroys all or
part of disk storage
 Destruction is assumed to be detectable: disk drives use checksums
to detect failures
 Recovery Algorithms

 Recovery algorithms are techniques to ensure database

consistency and transaction atomicity and durability despite
failures
 Focus of this chapter
 Recovery algorithms have two parts
1. Actions taken during normal transaction processing to ensure
enough information exists to recover from failures
2. Actions taken after a failure to recover the database contents to a
state that ensures atomicity, consistency and durability
 Storage Structure

 Volatile storage:
 does not survive system crashes
 examples: main memory, cache memory
 Nonvolatile storage:
 survives system crashes
 examples: disk, tape, flash memory,
non-volatile (battery backed up) RAM
 Stable storage:
 a mythical form of storage that survives all failures
 approximated by maintaining multiple copies on distinct nonvolatile
media
 Stable-Storage Implementation

 Maintain multiple copies of each block on separate disks

 copies can be at remote sites to protect against disasters such as fire or
flooding.
 Failure during data transfer can still result in inconsistent copies: Block
transfer can result in
 Successful completion
 Partial failure: destination block has incorrect information
 Total failure: destination block was never updated
 Protecting storage media from failure during data transfer (one solution):
 Execute output operation as follows (assuming two copies of each block):
1. Write the information onto the first physical block.
2. When the first write successfully completes, write the same information
onto the second physical block.
3. The output is completed only after the second write successfully
completes.
 Stable-Storage Implementation (Cont.)

 Protecting storage media from failure during data transfer (cont.):

 Copies of a block may differ due to failure during output operation. To
recover from failure:
1. First find inconsistent blocks:
1. Expensive solution: Compare the two copies of every disk block.
2. Better solution:
 Record in-progress disk writes on non-volatile storage (Non-
volatile RAM or special area of disk).
 Use this information during recovery to find blocks that may be
inconsistent, and only compare copies of these.
 Used in hardware RAID systems
2. If either copy of an inconsistent block is detected to have an error (bad
checksum), overwrite it by the other copy. If both have no error, but are
different, overwrite the second block by the first block.
 Data Access

 Physical blocks are those blocks residing on the disk.

 Buffer blocks are the blocks residing temporarily in main
memory.
 Block movements between disk and main memory are initiated
through the following two operations:
 input(B) transfers the physical block B to main memory.
 output(B) transfers the buffer block B to the disk, and replaces the
appropriate physical block there.
 Each transaction T has its private work-area in which local
i
copies of all data items accessed and updated by it are kept.
 Ti's local copy of a data item X is called xi.
 We assume, for simplicity, that each data item fits in, and is
stored inside, a single block.
 Data Access (Cont.)

 Transaction transfers data items between system buffer blocks

and its private work-area using the following operations :
 read(X) assigns the value of data item X to the local variable xi.
 write(X) assigns the value of local variable xi to data item {X} in the
buffer block.
 both these commands may necessitate the issue of an input(BX)
instruction before the assignment, if the block BX in which X resides
is not already in memory.
 Transactions
 Perform read(X) while accessing X for the first time;
 All subsequent accesses are to the local copy.
 After last access, transaction executes write(X).
 output(B ) need not immediately follow write(X). System can
X
perform the output operation when it deems fit.
 Example of Data Access
buffer
Buffer Block A x input(A)

Buffer Block B Y A
output(B) B
read(X)
write(Y)

x2 disk
x1
y1

work area work area

of T1 of T2
memory
 Recovery and Atomicity

 Modifying the database without ensuring that the transaction will

commit may leave the database in an inconsistent state.
 Consider transaction Ti that transfers $50 from account A to
account B; goal is either to perform all database modifications
made by Ti or none at all.
 Several output operations may be required for Ti (to output A
and B). A failure may occur after one of these modifications have
been made but before all of them are made.
 Recovery and Atomicity (Cont.)

 To ensure atomicity despite failures, we first output information

describing the modifications to stable storage without modifying
the database itself.
 We study two approaches:
 log-based recovery, and
 shadow-paging
 We assume (initially) that transactions run serially, that is, one
after the other.
 Log-Based Recovery
 A log is kept on stable storage.
 The log is a sequence of log records, and maintains a record of update
activities on the database.
 When transaction Ti starts, it registers itself by writing a
<Ti start>log record
 Before Ti executes write(X), a log record <Ti, X, V1, V2> is written,
where V1 is the value of X before the write, and V2 is the value to be
written to X.
 Log record notes that Ti has performed a write on data item Xj Xj had value
V1 before the write, and will have value V2 after the write.
 When Ti finishes it last statement, the log record <Ti commit> is written.
 We assume for now that log records are written directly to stable storage
(that is, they are not buffered)
 Two approaches using logs
 Deferred database modification
 Immediate database modification
 Deferred Database Modification

 The deferred database modification scheme records all

modifications to the log, but defers all the writes to after partial
commit.
 Assume that transactions execute serially
 Transaction starts by writing <Ti start> record to log.

 A write(X) operation results in a log record <Ti, X, V> being

written, where V is the new value for X
 Note: old value is not needed for this scheme
 The write is not performed on X at this time, but is deferred.
 When Ti partially commits, <Ti commit> is written to the log
 Finally, the log records are read and used to actually execute the
previously deferred writes.
 Deferred Database Modification (Cont.)
 During recovery after a crash, a transaction needs to be redone if
and only if both <Ti start> and<Ti commit> are there in the log.
 Redoing a transaction T ( redoT ) sets the value of all data items
i i
updated by the transaction to the new values.
 Crashes can occur while
 the transaction is executing the original updates, or
 while recovery action is being taken
 example transactions T and T (T executes before T ):
0 1 0 1

T0: read (A) T1 : read (C)

A: - A - 50 C:- C- 100
Write (A) write (C)
read (B)
B:- B + 50
write (B)
 Deferred Database Modification (Cont.)
 Below we show the log as it appears at three instances of time.

 If log on stable storage at time of crash is as in case:

(a) No redo actions need to be taken
(b) redo(T0) must be performed since <T0 commit> is present
(c) redo(T0) must be performed followed by redo(T1) since
<T0 commit> and <Ti commit> are present
 Immediate Database Modification

 The immediate database modification scheme allows database

updates of an uncommitted transaction to be made as the writes
are issued
 since undoing may be needed, update logs must have both old value
and new value
 Update log record must be written before database item is written
 We assume that the log record is output directly to stable storage
 Can be extended to postpone log record output, so long as prior to
execution of an output(B) operation for a data block B, all log
records corresponding to items B must be flushed to stable storage
 Output of updated blocks can take place at any time before or
after transaction commit
 Order in which blocks are output can be different from the order
in which they are written.
 Immediate Database Modification Example
Log Write Output

<T0 start>
<T0, A, 1000, 950>
To, B, 2000, 2050
A = 950
B = 2050
<T0 commit>
x1
<T1 start>
<T1, C, 700, 600>
C = 600
B B , BC
<T1 commit>
BA
 Note: BX denotes block containing X.
 Immediate Database Modification (Cont.)
 Recovery procedure has two operations instead of one:
 undo(Ti) restores the value of all data items updated by Ti to their old
values, going backwards from the last log record for Ti
 redo(Ti) sets the value of all data items updated by Ti to the new
values, going forward from the first log record for Ti
 Both operations must be idempotent
 That is, even if the operation is executed multiple times the effect is
the same as if it is executed once
 Needed since operations may get re-executed during recovery
 When recovering after failure:
 Transaction Ti needs to be undone if the log contains the record
<Ti start>, but does not contain the record <Ti commit>.
 Transaction Ti needs to be redone if the log contains both the record
<Ti start> and the record <Ti commit>.
 Undo operations are performed first, then redo operations.
 Immediate DB Modification Recovery
Example
Below we show the log as it appears at three instances of time.

Recovery actions in each case above are:

(a) undo (T0): B is restored to 2000 and A to 1000.
(b) undo (T1) and redo (T0): C is restored to 700, and then A and B are
set to 950 and 2050 respectively.
(c) redo (T0) and redo (T1): A and B are set to 950 and 2050
respectively. Then C is set to 600
 Checkpoints

 Problems in recovery procedure as discussed earlier :

1. searching the entire log is time-consuming
2. we might unnecessarily redo transactions which have already
3. output their updates to the database.
 Streamline recovery procedure by periodically performing
checkpointing
1. Output all log records currently residing in main memory onto stable
storage.
2. Output all modified buffer blocks to the disk.
3. Write a log record < checkpoint> onto stable storage.
 Checkpoints (Cont.)

 During recovery we need to consider only the most recent

transaction Ti that started before the checkpoint, and
transactions that started after Ti.
1. Scan backwards from end of log to find the most recent
<checkpoint> record
2. Continue scanning backwards till a record <Ti start> is found.
3. Need only consider the part of log following above start record.
Earlier part of log can be ignored during recovery, and can be
erased whenever desired.
4. For all transactions (starting from Ti or later) with no <Ti commit>,
execute undo(Ti). (Done only in case of immediate modification.)
5. Scanning forward in the log, for all transactions starting from
Ti or later with a <Ti commit>, execute redo(Ti).
 Example of Checkpoints

Tc Tf
T1
T2
T3
T4

checkpoint system failure

 T1 can be ignored (updates already output to disk due to checkpoint)

 T2 and T3 redone.

 T4 undone
 Shadow Paging

 Shadow paging is an alternative to log-based recovery; this

scheme is useful if transactions execute serially
 Idea: maintain two page tables during the lifetime of a transaction –
the current page table, and the shadow page table
 Store the shadow page table in nonvolatile storage, such that state
of the database prior to transaction execution may be recovered.
 Shadow page table is never modified during execution
 To start with, both the page tables are identical. Only current page
table is used for data item accesses during execution of the
transaction.
 Whenever any page is about to be written for the first time
 A copy of this page is made onto an unused page.
 The current page table is then made to point to the copy
 The update is performed on the copy
Sample Page Table
 Example of Shadow Paging
Shadow and current page tables after write to page 4
 Shadow Paging (Cont.)
 To commit a transaction :
1. Flush all modified pages in main memory to disk
2. Output current page table to disk
3. Make the current page table the new shadow page table, as follows:
 keep a pointer to the shadow page table at a fixed (known) location on disk.
 to make the current page table the new shadow page table, simply update
the pointer to point to current page table on disk
 Once pointer to shadow page table has been written, transaction is
committed.
 No recovery is needed after a crash — new transactions can start right
away, using the shadow page table.
 Pages not pointed to from current/shadow page table should be freed
(garbage collected).
 Show Paging (Cont.)
 Advantages of shadow-paging over log-based schemes
 no overhead of writing log records
 recovery is trivial
 Disadvantages :
 Copying the entire page table is very expensive
 Can be reduced by using a page table structured like a B+-tree
– No need to copy entire tree, only need to copy paths in the tree
that lead to updated leaf nodes
 Commit overhead is high even with above extension
 Need to flush every updated page, and page table
 Data gets fragmented (related pages get separated on disk)
 After every transaction completion, the database pages containing old
versions of modified data need to be garbage collected
 Hard to extend algorithm to allow transactions to run concurrently
 Easier to extend log based schemes
 Recovery With Concurrent Transactions

 We modify the log-based recovery schemes to allow multiple

transactions to execute concurrently.
 All transactions share a single disk buffer and a single log
 A buffer block can have data items updated by one or more transactions
 We assume concurrency control using strict two-phase locking;
 i.e. the updates of uncommitted transactions should not be visible to other
transactions
 Otherwise how to perform undo if T1 updates A, then T2 updates A and
commits, and finally T1 has to abort?
 Logging is done as described earlier.
 Log records of different transactions may be interspersed in the log.
 The checkpointing technique and actions taken on recovery have to be
changed
 since several transactions may be active when a checkpoint is performed.
 Recovery With Concurrent Transactions (Cont.)
 Checkpoints are performed as before, except that the checkpoint log
record is now of the form
< checkpoint L>
where L is the list of transactions active at the time of the checkpoint
 We assume no updates are in progress while the checkpoint is carried
out (will relax this later)
 When the system recovers from a crash, it first does the following:
1. Initialize undo-list and redo-list to empty
2. Scan the log backwards from the end, stopping when the first
<checkpoint L> record is found.
For each record found during the backward scan:
 if the record is <T commit>, add T to redo-list
i i

 if the record is <T start>, then if T is not in redo-list, add T to undo-

i i i
list
3. For every Ti in L, if Ti is not in redo-list, add Ti to undo-list
 Recovery With Concurrent Transactions (Cont.)

 At this point undo-list consists of incomplete transactions which

must be undone, and redo-list consists of finished transactions
that must be redone.
 Recovery now continues as follows:
1. Scan log backwards from most recent record, stopping when
<Ti start> records have been encountered for every Ti in undo-list.
 During the scan, perform undo for each log record that belongs
to a transaction in undo-list.
2. Locate the most recent <checkpoint L> record.
3. Scan log forwards from the <checkpoint L> record till the end of
the log.
 During the scan, perform redo for each log record that belongs
to a transaction on redo-list
 Example of Recovery

 Go over the steps of the recovery algorithm on the following log:

<T0 start>
<T0, A, 0, 10>
<T0 commit>
<T1 start>
<T1, B, 0, 10>
<T2 start> /* Scan in Step 4 stops here */
<T2, C, 0, 10>
<T2, C, 10, 20>
<checkpoint {T1, T2}>
<T3 start>
<T3, A, 10, 20>
<T3, D, 0, 10>
<T3 commit>
 Log Record Buffering

 Log record buffering: log records are buffered in main memory,

instead of of being output directly to stable storage.
 Log records are output to stable storage when a block of log records
in the buffer is full, or a log force operation is executed.
 Log force is performed to commit a transaction by forcing all its log
records (including the commit record) to stable storage.
 Several log records can thus be output using a single output
operation, reducing the I/O cost.
 Log Record Buffering (Cont.)

 The rules below must be followed if log records are buffered:

 Log records are output to stable storage in the order in which they
are created.
 Transaction Ti enters the commit state only when the log record
<Ti commit> has been output to stable storage.
 Before a block of data in main memory is output to the database, all
log records pertaining to data in that block must have been output to
stable storage.
 This rule is called the write-ahead logging or WAL rule

– Strictly speaking WAL only requires undo information to be

output
 Database Buffering
 Database maintains an in-memory buffer of data blocks
 When a new block is needed, if buffer is full an existing block needs to be
removed from buffer
 If the block chosen for removal has been updated, it must be output to disk
 As a result of the write-ahead logging rule, if a block with uncommitted
updates is output to disk, log records with undo information for the updates
are output to the log on stable storage first.
 No updates should be in progress on a block when it is output to disk. Can
be ensured as follows.
 Before writing a data item, transaction acquires exclusive lock on block containing
the data item
 Lock can be released once the write is completed.
 Such locks held for short duration are called latches.
 Before a block is output to disk, the system acquires an exclusive latch on the
block
 Ensures no update can be in progress on the block
 Buffer Management (Cont.)

 Database buffer can be implemented either

 in an area of real main-memory reserved for the database, or
 in virtual memory
 Implementing buffer in reserved main-memory has drawbacks:
 Memory is partitioned before-hand between database buffer and
applications, limiting flexibility.
 Needs may change, and although operating system knows best how
memory should be divided up at any time, it cannot change the
partitioning of memory.
 Buffer Management (Cont.)

 Database buffers are generally implemented in virtual memory in

spite of some drawbacks:
 When operating system needs to evict a page that has been
modified, to make space for another page, the page is written to
swap space on disk.
 When database decides to write buffer page to disk, buffer page
may be in swap space, and may have to be read from swap space
on disk and output to the database on disk, resulting in extra I/O!
 Known as dual paging problem.
 Ideally when swapping out a database buffer page, operating
system should pass control to database, which in turn outputs page
to database instead of to swap space (making sure to output log
records first)
 Dual paging can thus be avoided, but common operating
systems do not support such functionality.
Failure with Loss of Nonvolatile Storage

 So far we assumed no loss of non-volatile storage

 Technique similar to checkpointing used to deal with loss of non-volatile
storage
 Periodically dump the entire content of the database to stable storage
 No transaction may be active during the dump procedure; a procedure
similar to checkpointing must take place
 Output all log records currently residing in main memory onto stable
storage.
 Output all buffer blocks onto the disk.
 Copy the contents of the database to stable storage.
 Output a record <dump> to log on stable storage.
 To recover from disk failure
 restore database from most recent dump.
 Consult the log and redo all transactions that committed after the dump
 Can be extended to allow transactions to be active during dump;
known as fuzzy dump or online dump
 Will study fuzzy checkpointing later