Patent ID: 7383274

Claim:
A system that facilitates providing a compact representation of a file path, comprising: a processor; an interface that receives a hierarchical structure associated with data stored in a file storage system; a path component that provides a compact representation of the hierarchical structure to provide a transition from an item ID to the file path and from the file path to the item ID; an analyzer component that analyzes the file storage system to determine a tree structure associated to the file storage system, wherein the tree structure includes at least one of a node, a leaf node, the file path, and a file; a generator component that provides the compact representation based at least in part upon the tree structure and the file path, wherein the node, the leaf node and the file are numbered and the file path is represented by concatenating the numbers to allow seamless interacts between file paths with the file storage system and items within a data storage system, such that items with the data storage system utilize the file paths respective to the file storage system; and a query component that facilitates searching the data storage system by utilizing at least a descendant limit of the file path that is to be greater than a path value but less than the file path that is a sibling.