Patent ID: 8819370

Claim:
A method for storage lifecycle policy management comprising: creating a version of a storage lifecycle policy; associating, using at least one computer processor, the created version of the storage lifecycle policy with one or more portions of data created during a storage management job instantiated under the created version of the storage lifecycle policy; receiving a request to modify the created version of the storage lifecycle policy; ensuring that one or more modifications to the created version of the storage lifecycle policy identified in the request do not disrupt processing of the one or more portions of data associated with the created version of the storage lifecycle policy, wherein ensuring that one or more modifications identified in the request do not disrupt processing of the one or more portions of data comprises one or more of: ensuring that modification does not change a type of job destination; ensuring that modification does not change a retention type for a destination; ensuring that modification does not change a source of a destination; ensuring that modification does not change a data classification specified in the created version of the storage lifecycle policy; and ensuring that modification does not change a number of destinations specified in the created version of the storage lifecycle policy; and modifying the created version of the storage lifecycle policy.