Noah: low-cost file access prediction through pairs

Prediction is a powerful tool for performance and usability. It can reduce access latency for I/O systems, and can improve usability for mobile computing systems by automating the file hoarding process. We present recent research that has resulted in a file successor predictor that matches the performance of state-of-the-art context-modeling predictors, while requiring a small fraction of their space requirements. Noah is an online algorithm for predicting successor file access events, effectively identifying strong pairings (successor relationships) among files. Noah can accurately predict approximately 80% of all file access events while tracking only two candidate successors, of which only one requires regular dynamic updates.