Patent ID: 7240329

Claim:
A method comprising performing a machine-executed operation involving instructions, wherein the machine-executed operation is at least one of: A) sending the instructions over transmission media; B) receiving the instructions over transmission media; C) storing the instructions onto a machine-readable storage medium; and D) executing the instructions; wherein the instructions are instructions which, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform the steps of: storing within a database and in association with a file system, a first object that defines a first method and an implementation of said first method, wherein said first object is an instance of a first object class; and associating said first method with a first instance of a second object class that defines the properties of a file type associated with said file system such that said first method belongs to said first instance of said second object class and is capable of performing operations on data stored in said first instance of said second class, wherein the first method is not a method in said second object class.