Patent ID: 7421556

Claim:
A method for migrating data between storage devices manufactured by different vendors while maintaining data access to one of said storage devices, said method comprising: allowing a first virtualizer associated with a storage network to access a disk as said first virtualizer's managed disk, wherein said disk is controlled by a storage controller and said disk was previously presented by said storage controller to a server within said storage network; constructing a first virtual disk of said first virtualizer by said first virtualizer based on capacity available in said first virtualizer's managed disk; presenting said first virtual disk by said first virtualizer to a second virtualizer associated with said storage network to allow said second virtualizer to access said first virtual disk as said second virtualizer's managed disk; constructing a second virtual disk of said second virtualizer by said second virtualizer via a one-to-one mapping of said second virtualizer's managed disk; progressively migrating stored data from said first virtualizer to said second virtualizer; and unmapping said managed disks from said first and second virtualizers after said data migration has been completed.