Patent ID: 6988101

Claim:
An extensible file access method for accessing a foreign file system from a data processing system with a native file system, said foreign file system and said native file system implementing different file system protocols, and wherein files created by the foreign file system may not be accessed using a native file system protocol, said file access method comprising: issuing a request according to the native file system protocol to perform a file system operation with respect to the foreign file system; translating the native file system request to an intermediate programming interface, wherein the intermediate programming interface is different from both the native file system protocol and a foreign file system protocol, and wherein the intermediate programming interface comprises a set of generic access functions common to the native file system protocol and the foreign file system protocol; translating the intermediate programming interface to a file system request according to the foreign file system protocol; using the translated file system request according to the foreign file system protocol to perform the requested file system operation with respect to the foreign file system; and returning to the data processing system a response from the foreign file system responsive to the translated request in the foreign file system protocol.