Patent ID: 7269612

Claim:
A computer implemented method for generating containers for use in storing data, comprising: defining a plurality of containers in a computer readable medium, wherein a first level of containers indicates first level attributes providing capabilities for a computational resource and a second level of storage containers indicates a plurality of storage attributes providing storage capabilities of a storage resource and storage management capabilities in addition to the storage capabilities of the storage resource and at least one function to manage the storage resource to store data according to the provided storage resource and storage management capabilities indicated in the storage attributes; defining first level policies in the computer readable medium that map data attributes of the data to the first level containers; defining storage policies in the computer readable medium that associate data attributes of data concerned with management of the data to storage containers by enabling operations to be performed, the operations comprising: determining storage attributes corresponding to data attributes of the data; determining one of the storage containers using information on the determined storage attributes and the first level container to which the data attributes of the data map, wherein each defined storage container is adapted to provide requirements to determine a storage resource to store the data having the data attributes, and wherein the defined storage container is adapted to provide the storage resource with at least one function for storing the data; and using the at least one function indicated by the determined storage container to store the data in a manner that satisfies the storage attributes defined by the determined storage container.