Patent ID: 8706959

Claim:
A method for managing a virtual storage machine, comprising: identifying at least one unassigned volume in at least one physical array; associating the identified volumes to the virtual storage machine; naming each of the identified volumes a unique name independent of the at least one physical array; assigning at least one path to the virtual storage machine, the at least one path connects to the virtual storage machine using the unique name; forming a cluster with the at least one physical array as nodes of the cluster, wherein each of the nodes is identified by the unique name; and sharing metadata within the cluster by contacting a node of the virtual storage machine by the at least one physical array, seeking a permission to join the virtual storage machine from the node, changing the metadata to add the at least one physical array, creating a snapshot of the metadata, sending the snapshot of the metadata to the at least one physical array, and replicating the metadata to the nodes of the virtual storage machine to share the metadata among the nodes.