Probabilistic Failure Detection for Efficient Distributed Storage Maintenance

Distributed storage systems often use data replication to mask failures and guarantee high data availability. Node failures can be transient or permanent. While the system must generate new replicas to replace replica lost to permanent failures, it can save significant replication costs by not replicating following transient faults. Given the unpredictability of network dynamics, however, distinguishing permanent and transient failures is extremely difficult. Traditional timeout approaches are difficult to tune and can introduce unnecessary replication.