Systems and methods for fail-over witness sled operations

A chassis management controller installed within a chassis comprising one or more IHSs (Information Handling Systems) and further comprising a plurality of data storage devices, the chassis management controller comprising:

• a logic unit;
• and
• a memory device having instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by the logic unit, cause the chassis management controller to:
• initiate a connection with a witness sled installed in the IHS via a management signaling pathway;
• maintain a copy of witness transactions stored by the witness sled based on witness transactions transmitted by the witness sled to the chassis management controller via the management signaling pathway;
• notify one or more of the IHSs of witness operations supported by the chassis management controller in response to a detected fault in the witness sled;
• and
• utilize the copy of witness transactions to process witness transactions from the one or more IHSs while the witness sled is not operational.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage device having instructions stored thereon for management of a chassis comprising one or more IHSs (Information Handling Systems) and further comprising a plurality of data storage devices, wherein execution of the instructions by one or more processors in the chassis causes the one or more processors to:

• initiate a connection with a witness sled of the chassis via a management signaling pathway in response to a notification indicating a network fault in a high-speed connection used by at least one of the IHSs in communicating with the witness sled;
• receive a witness transaction from a first of the IHS;
• utilize the connection initiated via the management signaling pathway to submit the transaction for processing by the witness sled;
• and
• reporting a result of the transaction to the first IHS.