Importance

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Abstract

The present invention is a method, apparatus and computer program product for accelerating the copying of computer data that is repetitively copied from a source computer data storage medium to a destination computer data storage medium. The invention involves identifying situations in which computer data is repetitively copied and monitoring the copying, including noting the locations where the data is stored on the source computer storage medium. Without physically moving the data on the source computer storage medium, the data to be copied is gathered into groups based on the data locations in such a manner that future copying of this data from this source storage medium will be accelerated. During future copying of this data, the groups of data are copied together to the destination computer storage medium before the copying of the data is required. The data to be copied is grouped based on the physical copying characteristics of the source computer storage medium. These characteristics can vary with the type of medium and with the particular medium. The groups are chosen so that copying the groups of data together is more efficient than the individual copying that occurred during the monitoring. There are various situations in which computer data is repetitively copied in such a manner that future copying can be accelerated. The acceleration is most effective when the copying occurs in such a manner that the operating system or some other controlling software program cannot predict the order in which data will be loaded. This is particularly true when the data copying is being controlled by multiple computer programs, or the data being copied is not stored in a series of consecutive source storage medium locations.

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First Claim