Patent ID: 9558111
Date: 2017-01-31
CPC Classifications: G06F

Claim:
1. A method for reclaiming storage space in a thin provisioning environment, comprising: creating at least one balloon file in a target volume, wherein the at least one balloon file is a file created in the target volume that occupies storage space to be reclaimed from the target volume and that locks the storage space to be reclaimed from use, wherein the storage space to be reclaimed includes allocated storage space of the thin provisioning environment, and wherein the at least one balloon file is set to a size that corresponds to the storage space to be reclaimed and is identified by a data structure; obtaining information of the at least one balloon file in the target volume using the data structure; reclaiming storage space of the target volume according to the obtained information for the at least one balloon file independently of any data in, or input/output (I/O) writes to, the storage space to be reclaimed; and deleting the at least one balloon file, wherein, after deleting the at least one balloon file, the reclaimed storage space is available for use in a storage pool of the thin provisioning environment.