Users should be able understand the most important properties of files when accessing their data on storage devices. This is particularly important for storage media with distinctive features, such as molecular storage media and novel media still in development. The ideal user interface allows the user to view the properties of the media using a variety of visual methods and present them in the order of user data storage importance to the user.

When using an external hard disk drive for instance, people often find the capacity property to be the most critical. Early systems provided built-in tools that reported specific information about a user’s storage device. However they were primarily focused on displaying the capacity of the device in stacked bar charts and their variants (e.g. doughnut charts).

Modern systems present users with a range of aspects, such as the capacity of the file. For example, some systems display the lifespan of a file with the form of a graph or pie chart, which also shows the number of segments that have been accessed within the storage device and other data such as the probability of life span is displayed when the user hovers over stacks.

The issue is that IT teams are now required to collaborate with departments and users to provide cost-effective storage and quicker and safer access to the right data sets to support new initiatives and ideas. This shift requires IT teams to focus less on technology procurement and management of configurations and more on helping line-of-business users to help themselves with their own self-service needs.