Patent ID: 7096336

Claim:
An information processing system comprising: at least one computer device; at least one storage device having a plurality of physical storage regions for storing data used by said computer device; physical storage region characteristics managing means for managing a level of storage characteristics provided by each of said plurality of physical storage regions; data storage destination managing means for managing associations between said plurality of physical storage regions and data stored in each physical storage region; characteristics change managing means for managing previously determined temporal change in the level of the storage characteristics required of said storage destination physical storage region by the data managed by said data storage destination managing means; and movement instructing means for acquiring, at prescribed times, the level of storage characteristics in a storage destination required by the data at that time, for each data item managed by said data storage destination managing means, further acquiring the level of storage characteristics of said physical storage region in which said data is actually stored, from said physical storage region characteristics managing means, comparing said respective levels, and issuing an instruction to said storage device for said data to be moved to said physical storage region providing said required storage characteristics, wherein said characteristics change managing means comprises: a plurality of patterns of the temporal change in the level of said storage characteristics, and wherein the timing of said temporal change is established in accordance with a pattern and a date and time specified by the user.