Patent ID: 6983330

Claim:
A method of processing an out of band control command executed by a host computer in a multi-path system including the host computer, a device and multiple physical paths coupling the host computer to the device, the out of band control command identifying a target address in the device and bypassing at least one layer in a normal read/write path in the host computer, the out of band control command further identifying, from among the multiple physical paths, a target physical path for transmission of the out of band control command between the host computer and the device, the host computer comprising a plurality of adapters each adapted to interface the host computer to one of the multiple physical paths, the method comprising steps of: (A) selecting a selected physical path for transmitting out of band control command between the host computer and the device, the selected physical path being selected from among the multiple physical paths based upon a selection criteria that enables the selected physical path to be other than the target physical path identified by the out of band control command; and (B) transmitting the out of band control command through the one of the plurality of adapters corresponding to the selected path to the device over the selected physical path.