Patent ID: 8495022

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for synthetic backups, at least a portion of the method being performed by a computing device comprising at least one processor, the method comprising: identifying a full backup of a volume of files; identifying a set of incremental backups that were performed subsequently to the full backup; identifying a set of storage devices that store the full backup and the set of incremental backups; identifying a request to create a synthetic backup incorporating the full backup and the set of incremental backups; generating a sorted catalog for the synthetic backup by indexing files for the synthetic backup in a first order based on at least one characteristic of the files; creating the synthetic backup of the indexed files in the sorted catalog by reading the indexed files in a second order based on locations of the indexed files on the set of storage devices, wherein the first order of the files in the sorted catalog of the synthetic backup differs from the second order of the files in the synthetic backup.