Real time disk activity data for a disk drive is displayed on a multi-element
display in which each display element corresponds to a respective address range
or "activity bin" of the disk drive. When an access to the disk drive occurs, the
display element associated with the corresponding address is illuminated, with
the color of the illuminated element preferably indicating the type of the access
(e.g., read versus write). The display thus spatially indicates the type of disk
activity occurring. For example, a user can readily determine that a disk drive
is being accessed sequentially by identifying that the display elements are being
illuminated in sequence over time. In addition, the user can, in many cases, evaluate
the operation of an array of disk drives by viewing and comparing the illumination
patterns of the associated multi-element displays. For example, a user can easily
confirm that one drive in mirroring another drive by verifying that their illumination
patterns are synchronized. In a preferred embodiment, each multi-element display
is an 88 matrix of multi-color display elements, and is viewable from outside
of the computer cabinet in which the drive is housed. The display method may also
be embodied within a graphical user interface of a system administration software tool.
