Patent ID: 7191198

Claim:
A processor-readable storage medium embodying executable code of a storage operation management program for operating and managing replication of a volume inside a storage device or among a plurality of storage devices, the executable program code comprising: code for receiving a request for a copy source volume based on information indicating a feature of said copy source volume; code for one of creating and selecting said copy source volume based on said information; code for receiving a request for a copy destination volume; code for one of creating and selecting said copy destination volume to have said feature of said copy source volume, based on said request for a copy destination volume, based on a prestored relationship between said copy source volume and said information, and based on possible/impossible pairing information indicating that said copy destination volume has a pairing capability of forming a replication pair with said copy source volume to make possible the copying of contents of said copy source volume to said copy destination volume, said pairing information being specified by one of a user and an application; and code for copying the contents of said copy source volume to said copy destination volume.