Patent ID: 7487291

Claim:
A method for restricted update sharing of removable media in a media library, comprising: allowing media to be retrieved from storage slots of a media library and moved to a drive in a restricted update mode, wherein the media comprises: short term attributes that include short term media data structures, and long term attributes; providing a file system comprising a short term memory and a long term memory associated with the media; restricting updates to the long term attributes of the media; restricting updates to the long term memory of the file system, wherein the long term memory corresponds to the long term attributes of the media; allowing updates to the short term attributes of the media; allowing updates to the short term memory of the file system, wherein the short term memory corresponds to the short term attributes of the media; and refreshing the short term memory of the file system each time the media is moved to the drive, wherein refreshing the short term memory of the file system comprises: changing data in the short term memory of the file system back to an original state for the data in the short term memory; and rebuilding the data in the short term memory of the file system from the media data structures of the short term attributes each time the media is moved to the drive.