Patent ID: 7912817
Filing Date: 2011-03-22
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
1. A computer-implemented method comprising: decomposing by a data maintenance computer system a type of data item by identifying constituent units of the data item; creating by a data maintenance computer system a shelf-life criterion for the constituent units by assigning one or more priority dimensions to each data item and to each constituent unit, establishing one or more data life dimensions applicable to all the data items and constituent units of the data item type; for each of a plurality of data items of the data item type currently stored by data storage system, wherein the data items occupy an amount of computer storage, subsequent to the step of calculating or updating, decaying by a data maintenance computer system the data type by periodically deleting from the computer storage all constituent units which have decomposability indices exceeding a configured threshold, the decay reducing the amount of computer storage occupied by a remaining plurality of data items of the data type.