A method of distributing data in a distributed storage system includes receiving a file into non-transitory memory and dividing the received file into chunks. The chunks are data-chunks and non-data chunks. The method also includes grouping one or more of the data chunks and one or more of the non-data chunks in a group. One or more chunks of the group is capable of being reconstructed from other chunks of the group. The method also includes distributing the chunks of the group to storage devices of the distributed storage system based on a hierarchy of the distributed storage system. The hierarchy includes maintenance domains having active and inactive states, each storage device associated with a maintenance domain, the chunks of a group are distributed across multiple maintenance domains to maintain the ability to reconstruct chunks of the group when a maintenance domain is in an inactive state.