Patent ID: 7734713
Filing Date: 2010-06-08
Classification: G06F,H04L

Abstract:
1. A method of arbitrating access to a storage medium that is shared by M first computers operating on a WINDOWS operating system, M≧1, and N second computers, N≧1, the method comprising the steps of: determining, by a device, if SCSI (Small Computer Systems Interface) PR-flag (Prevent-remove flag) has been set; if the SCSI PR-flag has been set, preventing the N second computers from writing to the storage medium; setting, by a storage medium drive, a SCSI MC-flag (media-change flag) for each of said M first computers after one of the second computers writes to the storage medium using SCSI protocol; notifying the M first computers that contents of the storage medium have changed based on the SCSI MC-flag used by the SCSI protocol; delaying a write to the storage medium by the one of the N second computers for a timeout period when the PR-flag is set; and causing said write to fail if the timeout period has passed and the PR-flag is still set.