Patent ID: 7562101

Claim:
A method for performing block allocation testing on a storage server, the method comprising: retrieving, by the server, an entry from a data structure, the entry including a first inode of a first volume and a second inode of a second volume, wherein the first and second volumes are from a same family of volumes and the second volume is downstream from the first volume; identifying a first block pointer from the first inode; identifying a second block pointer from the second inode, wherein the second block pointer is located at the same offset within the second inode as the first block pointer in the first inode; determining whether a value of a copy on write indicator of the first block pointer satisfies a predetermined criterion for evaluation of correctness, based on a value of the first block pointer and a value of the second block pointer; and modifying the value of the copy on write indicator in response to a determination that the value does not satisfy the predetermined criterion, to maintain data integrity of the storage server.