US Patent 11556256 Fragmentation measurement solution

A degree of fragmentation is determined based on a number of holes present in a storage system layout or a portion of a layout. Edges between the holes and used portions of the storage system are tabulated by scanning a storage space. The occurrences of a pattern of used/available allocation units and/or the occurrences of another pattern available/used allocation units are recognized. A fragmentation value is calculated based on occurrences of the patterns in view of the total storage space. The present fragmentation measurement system utilizes the number of occurrences of the holes in assessing fragmentation.