Patent ID: 6889309

Claim:
A method of managing a virtual data storage object in a computer system including at least one host and at least one storage device that stores data written by the at least one host, the at least one storage device presenting at least one storage disk to the at least one host as a storage resource, the at least one host including at least one of a logical volume manager (LVM) that presents at least one logical volume to other layers in the host as a storage resource and a file system that presents at least one file to other layers in the host as a storage resource, the method comprising acts of: (A) creating the virtual data storage object to be independent of any particular host and any particular storage device; (B) creating the virtual data storage object so that at least one of the at least one logical volume and the at least one file is employed as a storage resource to store data stored to the virtual data storage object; (C) receiving a set of parameters that defines a plurality of data images for the virtual data storage object and a manner in which the plurality of data images are interrelated; and (D) automatically assigning the storage resources within the computer system to store each of the plurality of data images.