Adaptive raid width and distribution for flexible storage

A method comprising:

• subdividing storage capacity of local storage of a plurality of homogeneous storage nodes that are interconnected via a network into indexed same-size cells;
• creating and distributing members of protection groups across the storage nodes in the cells in a recursive fractal distribution pattern;
• and
• metamorphosing distribution of sets of the members of the protection groups from the recursive fractal distribution pattern to a linear distribution pattern in response to addition of new storage nodes, thereby enabling scaling in increments of single storage nodes.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that are executed by a computer to perform a method comprising:

• subdividing storage capacity of local storage of a plurality of homogeneous storage nodes that are interconnected via a network into indexed same-size cells;
• creating and distributing members of protection groups across the storage nodes in the cells in a recursive fractal distribution pattern;
• and
• metamorphosing distribution of sets of the members of the protection groups from the recursive fractal distribution pattern to a linear distribution pattern in response to addition of new storage nodes, thereby enabling scaling in increments of single storage nodes.