Towards a Random Walk Controller for Block Management and Wear Leveling in Flash Memory

Flash memory is widely adopted in various devices, but several intrinsic characteristics have strong impact on its performance and lifespan. In this paper, we analyze and compare in detail the existing algorithms for the three key components in the Flash Translation Layer, namely address translator, garbage collector, and wear leveler. Currently a major challenge is that existing solutions use different data structures for the three components respectively. In this paper, we motivate our design of a random walk controller, interacting with the three components, which will enable a more efficient mechanism for block management and wear leveling.