Eliminating duplicate data in storage systems with boot consolidation

A non-transitory computer storage medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon which, when executed by a computer system, cause the computer system to:

• provide a plurality of storage territories, each of the storage territories being subdivided into one or more provisions within a physical storage;
• provide a de-duplication territory;
• identify a plurality of duplicate provisions among the one or more provisions within the physical storage;
• allocate a new provision within the de-duplication territory for each of the plurality of duplicate provisions for consolidating the plurality of duplicate provisions;
• remap each of the plurality of duplicate provisions to one of the newly allocated provisions within the de-duplication territory;
• and
• consolidate the newly allocated provisions associated with each of the plurality of duplicate provisions within the de-duplication territory to point to a single physical storage provision within the physical storage, wherein the plurality of duplicate provisions are indirectly mapped to the single physical storage provision within the physical storage through the de-duplication territory.

A data storage system comprising:

• a storage server;
• a physical storage associated with the storage server;
• a processing unit associated with the storage server;
• and one or more modules for execution on the processing unit, operable to:
• provide a plurality of storage territories, each of the storage territories being subdivided into one or more provisions within the physical storage;
• provide a de-duplication territory;
• identify a plurality of duplicate provisions among the one or more provisions within the physical storage;
• allocate a new provision within the de-duplication territory for each of the plurality of duplicate provisions for consolidating the plurality of duplicate provisions;
• remap each of the plurality of duplicate provisions to one of the newly allocated provisions within the de-duplication territory;
• and
• consolidate the newly allocated provisions associated with each of the plurality of duplicate provisions within the de-duplication territory to point to a single physical storage provision within the physical storage, wherein the plurality of duplicate provisions are indirectly mapped to the single physical storage provision within the physical storage through the de-duplication territory.