Patent ID: 8874534

Claim:
A system comprising a first peer workstation client apparatus communicatively coupled to at least one other peer workstation client apparatus, each workstation client apparatus comprising: a processor configured by computer executable instructions to store, retrieve, and transform data and to track versions of files which are made up of file blocks and to intercept file block read and file block write commands issued by a program product; a file state view circuit configured to create, store, and retrieve metadata about file blocks, the versions of files that each block is a component of, and the location of each block in a local file block store whereby file blocks that are identical in multiple versions of a file are not redundantly stored; the local file block store for all file blocks that comprise versions of files whose metadata is stored in the file state view circuit, coupled to both the processor and to the file state view circuit; and at least one peer file system view circuit, whereby each peer file system view circuit stores and provides metadata previously received from other peer workstation client apparatuses about each file block previously stored in the file block store of each other peer, the version of the files each file block was previously a component of, and all the versions of all the files which were previously accessible to the other peer workstation client apparatus, and the location of each file block in the local file block store of the peer workstation client apparatus.