Patent ID: 8024292

Claim:
In a system that includes one or more clients in communication with a server that performs a backup operation of data from the one or more clients, the data being organized into backup groupings, a method for saving the data from a first client, the method comprising: generating a listing of backup groupings that are available for backup; receiving user input identifying multiple backup groupings for backup from the listing of backup groupings, wherein each backup grouping is associated with different writers that identify components for each backup grouping and wherein backup groupings that have interdependencies are identified in the listing of backup groupings; causing a backup manager module to generate a snapshot job request that serves as a command to the first client to generate a single snapshot, the snapshot job request including an indication of the multiple backup groupings to be saved in the single snapshot and the command to start components on the first client that generate the single snapshot for the multiple backup groupings; and at the first client, receiving the snapshot job request; receiving an indication of the multiple backup groupings to be saved; identifying one or more directories corresponding to the multiple backup groupings; and requesting creation of a single snapshot using at least a portion of each of the one or more identified directories, wherein the single snapshot includes volumes corresponding to the multiple backup groupings; creating a backup of each of the multiple backup groupings from the single snapshot, wherein the backup of each backup grouping is based from a same point in time of the single snapshot, creating a backup including: the server sending the first client an individual save job request for each of the multiple backup groupings, each individual save job request identifying one of the multiple backup groupings to be backed up and including a filename of the single snapshot; and for each individual save job request, the first client referencing the single snapshot to locate and backup a portion of the single snapshot corresponding to one of the multiple backup groupings; and storing online indexes with the backup, wherein the online indexes includes a media volume that identifies an index of backup volumes associated with the single snapshot and a client file index that identifies an index of data items included in the backup of the data.