Patent ID: 7231503

Claim:
In a storage system comprising a first storage area and a second storage area, a method of managing access to the first and second storage areas comprising: at a time T, performing communication between a first port of the storage system and at least one first device over a first network, the first port configured to perform I/O operations with the first storage area to service I/O requests received from the at least one first device, wherein the first port is associated with first configuration information; at time T, performing communication between a second port of the storage system and at least one second device over a second network, the second port configured to perform I/O operations with the second storage area to service I/O requests received from the at least one second device, wherein the second port is associated with second configuration information, wherein the first port is not in data communication with the second device associated with the second storage area and the second port is not in data communication with the first device associated with the first storage area; and subsequent to time T, performing: a first step of determining that the first port is not in data communication with the first device associated with the first storage area; a second step of determining that the second port is not in data communication with the second device associated with the second storage area; a third step of determining that there is data communication between the first port and the second device and in response thereto, reconfiguring the first port using the second configuration information so that the first port performs I/O operations with the second storage area in response to receiving I/O requests from the at least one second device; and a fourth step of determining that there is data communication between the second port and the first device and in response thereto, reconfiguring the second port using the first configuration information so that the second port performs I/O operations with the first storage area in response to receiving I/O requests from the at least one first device, wherein the first step of determining includes performing one or more communication tests between the first port and the first device, wherein the second step of determining includes performing one or more communication tests between the second port and the second device.