Abstract: The present invention is a method of creating and assigning a class of storage that is defined by the customer at initialization, such that specific object code is assigned to and used by the devices in a class of storage and such that the devices themselves are grouped according to class of storage. This method provides the customer with greater system design flexibility over conventional naming standards and also provides greater data integrity and security. The method of the present invention includes the steps of assigning a class of storage label, storing the class of storage label, determining whether the device is the correct class of storage for the assigned sub-device group, delivering an error message if the class of storage is incorrect, and assigning the device to a sub-device group, if the class of storage is correct.

Abstract: A method and system for interprocess communication (IPC) (300), which includes converting a message from the source computer process (310) into an extensible markup language (XML) document, and encoding the XML document into a simple object access protocol (SOAP) message. The SOAP message is transmitted to the destination computer process (312) via an interprocess communication (IPC) interface (326); The SOAP message is decoded to extract the XML document, and the XML document is translated to a language usable by the destination computer process. The system of IPC includes source (310) and destination (312) processes that have both XML layers (318 and 320) and SOAP layers (314 and 316) to effectuate transfer of messages in a way that is not application- or platform-specific. The computer processes may run on at least one redundant array of independent disks (RAID) controller (130).