Storage constrained synchronization of shared content items

• US 10,248,705 B2
• Filed: 07/13/2016
• Issued: 04/02/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 01/30/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Dropbox, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Dropbox, Inc.
• Inventors: Newhouse, Benjamin Zeis
• Primary Examiner(s): Ruiz, Angelica
• Application Number:
  US15/209,672
• Publication Number:
  US 20160321340A1
• Time in Patent Office: 993 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/178 Techniques for file synchronisation in file systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/1805 Append-only file systems, e.g. using logs or journals to store data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/27 Replication, distribution or synchronisation of data between databases or within a distributed database system; Distributed database system architectures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1097 for distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS]

Abstract

A content management system synchronizes content items across client computing systems connected by a network. Each client device has a storage allocation for synchronized shared content items. A client application on each client computing system creates shadow items, representing the content item but only containing the metadata of the content item. Attributes of the content item represented by the shadow item are stored in a file journal entry corresponding to the shadow item. When viewing attributes of the shadow item in the file system of the client computing device, the client device displays the attributes corresponding to the content item represented by the shadow item as opposed to the attributes of the shadow item itself. The attributes may show that the shadow item occupies negligible space on disk while displaying a non-zero content item size.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

storing, by a client device, a shadow item representing a content item on the client device, wherein

     1) the content item includes content data and metadata,

     2) the content data is stored on a host device that is remote to the client device without the content data of the content item being stored on the client device, and

     3) the shadow item only stores the metadata on the client device, and wherein the metadata corresponds to file attributes of the content item stored on the host device including at least a size of the content item;

receiving a request to view the file attributes in a file system interface of the client device, the request associated with a selection of the shadow item;

retrieving the metadata associated with the shadow item in response to the request; and

displaying the retrieved metadata including the size of the content item as the file attributes in the file system interface of the client device, wherein at least some of the displayed metadata attributes correspond to the metadata attributes of the content item represented by the shadow item.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 further comprising:

maintaining a file journal, by the client device, the file journal including a plurality of entries, each entry corresponding to a content item associated with a user account and listing metadata of the corresponding content item.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein the shadow item includes a reference to a file journal entry in the file journal corresponding to the represented content item.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 3, wherein retrieving metadata associated with the shadow item comprises retrieving metadata from the file journal entry in the file journal corresponding to the represented content item.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 further comprising:

displaying in the file system interface of the client device the shadow item such that it appears as if the represented content item is stored on the client device.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein displaying the retrieved metadata further comprises displaying within the file system interface the size of the content item.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein displaying the retrieved metadata further comprises displaying within the file system interface a file type attribute, the file type attribute showing a file type of the content item on the remote host device not a file type of the shadow item representing the content item.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising, synchronizing the file journal entry of the shadow item with the remote host device.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the metadata stored by the client device further includes a type of the content item.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the metadata stored by the client device further includes a path of the content item stored by the host device.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the metadata stored by the client device further includes access privileges associated with the content item.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the metadata stored by the client device further includes modification information associated with the content item.

13. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processor causes the processor to perform steps of:

storing, by a client device, a shadow item representing a content item on the client device, wherein

     1) the content item includes content data and metadata,

     2) the content data is stored on a host device that is remote to the client device without the content data of the content item being stored on the client device, and

     3) the shadow item only stores the metadata on the client device, and wherein the metadata corresponds to file attributes of the content item stored on the host device including at least a size of the content item;

receiving a request to view the file attributes in a file system interface of the client device, the request associated with the shadow item;

retrieving the metadata associated with the shadow item in response to the request; and

displaying the retrieved metadata including the size of the content item as the file attributes in the file system interface of the client device, wherein at least some of the displayed metadata attributes correspond to the metadata attributes of the content item represented by the shadow item.

14. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 13, wherein displaying within the file system interface the retrieved metadata further comprises displaying:

the size of the content item, and

a file type attribute, the file type attribute showing a file type of the content item on the remote host device not a file type of the shadow item representing the content item.

15. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 13, further comprising, synchronizing the file journal entry of the shadow item with the remote host device.

16. A computer-implemented method comprising:

storing, by a client device, a shadow item representing a content item on the client device, wherein the content item includes content data and metadata, the content data is stored on a host device that is remote to the client device without the content data of the content item being on the client device, and the shadow item includes only the metadata on the client device, and wherein the metadata corresponds to file attributes of the content item stored on the host device including at least a size of the content item;

receiving a request to view the file attributes, the request associated with a selection of the shadow item; and

displaying the requested file attributes including the size of the content item in a file system interface of the client device.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 16 further comprising:

maintaining a file journal, by the client device, the file journal including a plurality of entries, each entry corresponding to a content item associated with a user account and listing metadata of the corresponding content item; and

wherein the shadow item includes a reference to a file journal entry in the file journal corresponding to the represented content item.

18. The computer-implemented method of claim 17, wherein displaying the requested file attributes comprises retrieving the metadata from the file journal entry in the file journal corresponding to the content item represented by the shadow item.

19. The computer-implemented method of claim 17, further comprising, synchronizing the file journal entry of the shadow item with the remote host device.

20. The computer-implemented method of claim 16, wherein displaying the requested file attributes further comprises displaying the shadow item such that it appears as if the content item is stored on the client device.

21. The computer-implemented method of claim 16, wherein the requested file attributes include a file type attribute, the file type attribute showing a file type of the content item on the remote host device not a file type of the shadow item representing the content item.