indicator 515 and an object data area 507 each key segment 504 506 contains an implied or explicit segment number 511 513 respectively each index 508 510 contains at least three index elements per entry the key segment value 504 the key segment number 511 and the object data pointer 502 index a 508 index b 509 and index c 510 differ in that each represents a permutation of the three key element types for the sake of brevity only three indices are shown in fig5 all indices 508 510 are maintained in sorted order such that the first element of each key record represents the most significant sort information the second the next most significant and so on and such that the last element represents the least significant sort information according to one embodiment of the present invention an exact match for a given object data block 507 may be found by performing successive retrievals based on the structure of index b 509 in this method the search algorithm begins with the set of key records in which key segment value one 504 and the segment number 511 match the desired key segment value and segment number for each of these matching records a match where key segment two 505 and key segment number 512 also match the desired value for key segment two but also where pointer 502 is the same between both records in the present embodiment index c 510 would provide the ability to search for the remaining segment values in.