Patent ID: 8832148

Claim:
A computer implemented method for storing and accessing collected artifacts in an electronic discovery system (EDMS), comprising the steps of: providing an EDMS configured to manage electronic discovery workflow in an enterprise, to issue and propagate instructions to a collection agent, and to generate one or more collection plans, wherein the one or more collection plans specify one or more custodians that are responsible for data in the enterprise; automatically issuing collection instructions for information technology (IT) and integrating said collection instructions with an overall discovery workflow; providing an evidence repository for managing collected artifacts along with contextual data and metadata, wherein the evidence repository includes a transient storage area to which collected artifacts are deposited, wherein the transient storage area includes a directory structure created based on the one or more collection plans, and wherein the directory structure includes one or more folders that are locations automatically provisioned by the EDMS for depositing the collected artifacts for a given custodian in the one or more custodians; and providing the collection agent configured to perform artifact collection based on the one or more collection plans and to deposit collected artifacts to the one or more folders in the directory structure of the transient storage area based at least in part on a location path of the one or more folders and the one or more collection plans.