SELECTIVE CORRECTION OF DATA ERRORS

A method for scanning a mass-storage device in communication with a global memory includes allocating a scan buffer in the global memory for placement of information descriptive of any errors found during the scan. When a scanning utility identifies a data error on the mass-storage device, it writes structured information descriptive of the error to the scan buffer. This information is available to an error-correction utility. The error-correction utility uses this information to determine, with a minimum of human intervention, which data errors to repair and which to ignore.