Accessing a file system using tiered deduplication

A computer-readable medium, excluding transitory propagating signals, storing instructions that, when executed by a computing device having one or more processors and corresponding computer-readable memory, cause the computing device to perform a method for using deduplication in a storage management system to provide a virtual machine on the computing device with access to a file system, the method comprising:

• executing a pseudo-file-system driver on the computing device, which hosts the virtual machine and an associated data agent component of the storage management system;
• based on exposing a first mount point for the file system to the virtual machine, instantiating the file system,
• wherein the file system is stored in a primary storage device in communication with the computing device;
• and
• invoking, by the pseudo-file-system driver, at least one deduplication job that:
• (a) moves some data from the file system in the primary storage device to a secondary storage device component of the storage management system,
• (b) stores the moved data in deduplicated form thereto based at least in part on a deduplication database component of the storage management system, and
• thereby providing the virtual machine with access to the file system without a predefined limit on storage capacity for the file system.

A storage management system for using deduplication to provide a virtual machine with access to a file system of seemingly unlimited storage capacity, the system comprising:

• a first computing device comprising the virtual machine, a data agent, a pseudo-file-system driver, and a mount point exposed by the pseudo-file-system driver to the virtual machine,
• wherein the first computing device comprises one or more processors and corresponding computer-readable memory;
• a primary storage device in communication with the first computing device, wherein the primary storage device comprises data of the file system;
• a second computing device comprising a media agent and a deduplication database that is associated with the file system,
• wherein the second computing device comprises one or more processors and corresponding computer-readable memory;
• a secondary storage device in communication with the second computing device, wherein the secondary storage device comprises data stored in deduplicated form based on the deduplication database;
• wherein the pseudo-file-system driver is configured to provide the virtual machine with access to the file system appearing to lack a storage-capacity limit,
• based at least in part on at least one deduplication job invoked by the pseudo-file-system driver to:
• (a) move some data from the file system in the primary storage device to at least one of the media agent and the secondary storage device, and
• (b) store the moved data in deduplicated form thereto based at least in part on the deduplication database.