Vmware, Inc.

Erik Weathers

Ilia Langouev

Aleksey Pershin

Ping Lu

Sudarsan R Piduri

Alexei Jelvis

One embodiment is a method of installing a block-level write tracking driver in a Microsoft Windows&#x2122; operating system so that no reboot of the system is need, another embodiment is a method of installing a block-level write tracking driver in a Linux operating system so that no reboot of the system is needed, and still another embodiment is a method of tracking block-level writes to snapshots under newer Microsoft Windows&#x2122; operating systems.

Tracking block-level writes

Writes to blocks of a protected storage volume that occur between the beginning of a prior backup interval and the beginning of a current backup interval are tracked using a first snapshot that is maintained through the current backup interval. At the beginning of the current backup interval, a second snapshot is generated. Blocks that are indicated by a dirty block list of the first snapshot as having been changed are read from the snapshot volume for the second snapshot and copied to a backup storage volume. For the next backup interval, the second snapshot or alternatively, a newly generated third snapshot, is used to track writes to blocks of a protected storage volume that occur between the beginning of the current backup interval and the beginning of a next backup interval.

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San Jose, CA, United States of America

Erik Weathers