Abstract: An apparatus for determining the status of files stored, e.g., on the disk drive of a computer compares the name of a file to be inventoried (the "member" or "suspect" file) against a list of names of component files belonging to certain known file sets. If the member file's name compares favorably with one or more names of the component files the apparatus runs tests on the member file. These include comparing data stored in the member file with data patterns of the matching component files. The apparatus determines the confidence factor of the association between the member file and the matching component file based, at least in part, on the test results. Depending on the level of the confidence factor, it generates an output signal including the name of member file and the name of the set of the matching component file.