An application for managing digital assets regardless of type or format. The
application
allows assets to be check-in, either on an individual asset basis or on a group
basis, and check-out. Information regarding assets is stored in a data-base to
enable searching for the assets without searching the assets themselves. The user
is provided features for organizing assets retrieved in accordance with supplied
criteria and for performing actions on assets in a batch mode. Digital assets are
retrieved from the storage servers by queries. The query results are displayed
in a user-customizable Query Palette. User Views are provided to group references
or icons representing selected assets to organize the references to the assets
without affecting the organization of the assets themselves. Methods and processes
are applied to optimize asset management across a distributed architecture by monitoring
and balancing the load and usage of the server and the storage entities.