Patent ID: 8924367

Claim:
A method of processing a raw logical data object for storage in a storage network operable with at least one storage protocol, said method comprising: in response to a respective request, allocating in the storage device a compressed logical data object comprising a header and a plurality of accommodation sections each with a predefined size; receiving a plurality of data chunks, wherein at least two data chunks comprise different sizes; comparing a characteristic of a received data chunk to a predefined criterion related to an estimated or actual time of transformation of the data chunk, the predefined criterion including an estimated time necessary to compress data which, being compressed, would substantially amount to a compressed section size; compressing the received data chunk to transform the data into a transformed form and accumulating the compressed data chunk in one of the accommodation sections, if the predefined criterion matches the characteristic of the received data chunk; identifying the received data chunk as being in a non-transformed or partly transformed form and accumulating the non-transformed or partly transformed data chunk in the one of the accommodation sections, if the predefined criterion does not match the characteristic of the received data chunk, wherein the identification of the received data chunk as being in the non-transformed or partly transformed form included as entries in an index; repeating the comparing and at least one of the compressing step and the identifying step for each subsequently received data chunk, and accumulating subsequent compressed data chunks and non-transformed data chunks or subsequent compressed data chunks and partly transformed data chunks to form an accommodation section having a size matching the predefined size; and mapping the data chunks and data accommodated in the plurality of accommodation sections, wherein: the predefined sizes of the accommodation sections are equal to each other, and the non-transformed and partly transformed data chunks are data chunks where transformation of which has been interrupted.