Patent ID: 7818515

Claim:
A system comprising: one or more storage devices; at least one processor; and a memory coupled to the at least one processor; wherein the memory stores virtualization software executable by the at least one processor to aggregate storage in the one or more storage devices as a virtual storage device accessible to a storage consumer; wherein the virtualization software comprises a group validation layer executable by the at least one processor to determine whether a proposed group configuration operation on the one or more storage devices is valid, wherein said group validation layer comprises a device-independent interface to allow an application to manage the one or more storage devices as a virtual device group; wherein, in determining whether the proposed group configuration operation on the one or more storage devices is valid, the group validation layer is executable by the at least one processor, prior to performing the proposed group configuration operation, to: verify that the proposed group configuration operation allows the virtual storage device to support one or more desired virtualization functions; and verify that the proposed group configuration operation allows the virtual storage device to meet a quality-of-service requirement.