The present invention provides a hierarchical interface to an attribute based
database. The method includes organizing a number of classifiers of data into a
hierarchical structure and organizing the data into the hierarchical data structure
according to the classifiers to which the data is linked. The hierarchical data
structure can be a file system directory tree structure. The files system directory
tree structure can be according to the NFS protocol. A request is received from
a client, the request formatted according to the NFS protocol. The request is translated
into a database query. A result is produced which is formatted according to the
NFS protocol and the result is sent to the client. The present invention allows
data to be presented in rearrange-able order based on a client view and classifiers,
bound and unbound. The present invention also restricts access to files in a flexible manner.
