Patent ID: 8694708

Claim:
A method for controlling a multipath in a Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) network including a SAS initiator, a SAS target, a first SAS expander and a second SAS expander, the method comprising: forming, by the first SAS expander, a first path coupling the SAS initiator and a first port of the SAS target together; notifying, by the first SAS expander, the SAS initiator of a virtual expander address instead of a SAS address of the first SAS expander, the virtual expander address being a virtual SAS address owned in common by the first SAS expander and the second SAS expander; notifying, by the first SAS expander, the SAS initiator of a virtual target port address, at least instead of a SAS address of the first port of the SAS target, the virtual target port address being a SAS address of a virtual port of the SAS target; forming, by the second SAS expander, a second path coupling the SAS initiator and a second port of the SAS target together; notifying, by the second SAS expander, the SAS initiator of the virtual expander address instead of a SAS address of the second SAS expander; notifying, by the second SAS expander, the SAS initiator of the virtual target port address, at least instead of a SAS address of the second port of the SAS target; wherein upon receipt of data having the virtual target port address as a destination address, each of the first SAS expander and the second SAS expander transmits the data to the SAS target by using as the destination address a SAS address of a currently used one of the first port and the second port, and associated with the virtual target port address.