Organically managing primary and secondary storage of a data object based on an expiry timeframe supplied by a user of the data object

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10983986-B2
Application number	US-201916280973-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Feb 20, 2019
Priority date	Aug 31, 2015
Publication date	Apr 20, 2021
Grant date	Apr 20, 2021

Abstract

The illustrative systems and methods advantageously reduce the amount of storage space occupied by data that no longer has a useful life—as established by the data objects' user(s) and overcoming predetermined rules required by information management policies. An illustrative data agent may receive instructions from an illustrative storage manager to perform secondary copy operations for a given set of data objects. The instructions may generally instruct that expiry-marked data objects are to be treated based on parsing each data object's user-supplied expiry timeframe. The illustrative system (i) will delete expired data objects including expired secondary copies; (ii) will refrain from making secondary copies of expired data objects; and (iii) if an expiry-marked data object is not expired, the illustrative system will make secondary copies according to the instructions from the storage manager, but will track those expiry-marked secondary copies for future deletion after they expire, (iv) and will delete expired secondary copies even if the original expiry-marked data object has been deleted from the system prior to its expiration.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
storing a data object to a storage device in a data storage management system, wherein the data object comprises a user-supplied expiry timeframe for the data object, which is supplied when the data object is created;
based on a first policy that governs storage management for data that includes the data object, instructing, by a storage manager that manages the data storage management system, a data agent to perform a first secondary copy operation for the data that includes the data object, wherein the storage manager executes on a computing device that comprises one or more hardware processors;
by the data agent, before subjecting the data object to the first secondary copy operation, parsing the user-supplied expiry timeframe of the data object to determine whether the data object has expired, wherein the data agent executes on a computing device that comprises one or more hardware processors;
based on the data agent determining that the data object has expired,
by one of the data agent and the storage manager: causing the first secondary copy operation to be canceled for the data object; and

based on the data agent determining that the data object has not expired:
(i) performing the first secondary copy operation for the data object, wherein each of one or more secondary copies that result from at least the first secondary copy operation comprises the user-supplied expiry timeframe, and wherein each of the one or more secondary copies is stored in a format that is distinct from a native format of the data object in the storage device, and
(ii) by the data agent, indexing the one or more secondary copies of the data object into an index that tracks expiry-marked data objects.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein after the user-supplied expiry timeframe passes, secondary copies of the data object are deleted from the system even if the data object has been deleted from the system prior to the user-supplied expiry timeframe.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein after the user-supplied expiry timeframe passes, the data object is deleted from the storage device.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the index is used for deleting the one or more secondary copies of the data object after the user-supplied expiry timeframe passes.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:
by the storage manager, further instructing the data agent to perform a second secondary copy operation for data objects comprising at least one of: (A) the data object and (B) at least one of the one or more secondary copies of the data object; and
by the data agent, based on determining that the user-supplied expiry timeframe has passed:
(a) identifying the one or more secondary copies of the data object based on the index, and
(b) causing the one or more secondary copies of the data object to be deleted from the data storage management system.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first policy specifies that expired data objects as well as secondary copies of expired data objects are to be deleted from the data storage management system.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising:
by an application, receiving the user-supplied expiry timeframe from a user; and
by the application, associating the data object with the user-supplied expiry timeframe.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the data object comprises an email message, and further wherein the application is an email client that comprises a plugin component that prompts the user to supply the user-supplied expiry timeframe while creating the email message.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first policy is a scheduling policy that governs storage management timing for data that includes the data object, and the first policy indicates that expired data objects as well as secondary copies of expired data objects are to be deleted from the data storage management system.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the data object comprises an email message.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the data object comprises a file.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the data object comprises a folder in a file system.

13. A system for storage management based on user-supplied expiry timeframes for data objects, the system comprising:
a first computing device for executing: (a) an application that receives a user-supplied expiry timeframe for a data object while the data object is being created by the application, and (b) a first data management module associated with the application that created the data object, wherein the first computing device comprises one or more hardware processors;
a first storage device for storing the data object and the user-supplied expiry timeframe for the data object, wherein in the first storage device the data object is stored in a format that is native to the application;
a second storage device for storing one or more secondary copies of the data object, wherein a given secondary copy in the second storage device is stored in a format suitable to the given secondary copy that is distinct from the native format of the data object in the first storage device;
a second data management module for storing secondary copies to the second storage device, wherein the second data management module executes on one of: the first computing device, and a second computing device that comprises one or more hardware processors;
a storage manager for managing the system, wherein the storage manager is programmed to instruct the first data management module to perform a first storage management operation based on a first policy that governs storage management for data that includes the data object, wherein the storage manager comprises one or more hardware processors; and
wherein the first data management module is programmed to:
parse the user-supplied expiry timeframe for the data object to determine whether the data object has expired, and
based on determining that the data object has expired:
(A) prevent the first storage management operation from generating secondary copies of the data object, and

based on determining that the data object has not expired:
(a) cause one or more secondary copies of the data object to be generated according to the first policy, wherein each of the one or more secondary copies comprises the user-supplied expiry timeframe.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein after the user-supplied expiry timeframe passes, secondary copies of the data object are deleted from the system even if the data object has been deleted from the system prior to the user-supplied expiry timeframe.

15. The system of claim 13 , wherein the first data management module is further programmed to:
based on the determining that the data object has expired:
(B) indicate to the storage manager that at least one of: (i) the data object has expired, and (ii) no secondary copies of the data object were generated by the first storage management operation.

16. The system of claim 13 , wherein the first data management module is further programmed to:
based on the determining that the data object has not expired:
(b) index the one or more secondary copies of the data object into an index for finding and deleting the one or more secondary copies of the data object after the user-supplied expiry timeframe passes.

17. The system of claim 13 , wherein the second data management module is configured to: based on determining that the data object has expired, prevent more secondary copies of the data object from being generated in the system.

18. The system of

Assignees

• Commvault Systems Inc

Inventors

• Kumar Kuldeep

Classifications

• G06F16/2365 Primary

  Ensuring data consistency and integrity · CPC title

• G06F16/27

  Replication, distribution or synchronisation of data between databases or within a distributed database system; Distributed database system architectures therefor · CPC title

• G06F16/125 Primary

  characterised by the use of retention policies (retention policies for HSM systems G06F16/185) · CPC title