Patent ID: 7549028

Claim:
In a system that includes one or more clients in communication with a server that performs a backup operation of data from the one or more clients, the data being organized into one or more backup groupings, a method for saving the data from a first client, the method comprising: sending a list of all possible backup groupings to a server; receiving a snapshot job request from a backup manager module on the server, the snapshot job request identifying one or more backup groupings to be backed up, wherein data included in the one or more backup groupings are stored on a plurality of volumes, the snapshot job request acting as a signal to the first client to generate a single snapshot of the plurality of volumes; generating a single snapshot of data from the plurality of volumes; identifying the single snapshot of the plurality of volumes, the single snapshot including at least a portion of one or more directories corresponding to the one or more backup groupings; and referencing the single snapshot in order to perform a save of some or all of the data corresponding to the identified backup groupings associated with the plurality of volumes.