Altering access to a fibre channel fabric

A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having a computer readable program recorded thereon, wherein the computer readable program, when executed on a computing device, causes the computing device to:

• receive an indication that an identified communications adapter requires attention;
• issue a set of calls to a set of N_port identification virtualization server adapters coupled to the identified communications adapter, wherein each of the set of calls indicates to each of the set of N_port identification virtualization server adapters a request to move a set of clients from their assigned port on the identified communications adapter to an available port on a failover communications adapter;
• and
• move the set of clients from the identified communications adapter to the failover communications adapter, wherein the computer readable program to move each client in the set of clients from the identified communications adapter to the failover communications adapter further causes the computing device to:
• send a first event signal to the client indicating that connectivity has temporarily been lost;
• send a command to the identified communications adapter requesting that the identified communications adapter break an existing connection for the client;
• receive an acknowledgement that the identified communications adapter has broken the existing connection;
• send a connection command to the failover communications adapter requesting a new connection for the client;
• receive an acknowledgement that the failover communications adapter has established the new connection;
• and
• send a second event signal to the client indicating that connectivity has been reestablished.

An apparatus, comprising:

• a processor;
• and
• a memory coupled to the processor, wherein the memory comprises instructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:
• receive an indication that an identified communications adapter requires attention;
• issue a set of calls to a set of N_port identification virtualization server adapters coupled to the identified communications adapter, wherein each of the set of calls indicates to each of the set of N_port identification virtualization server adapters a request to move a set of clients from their assigned port on the identified communications adapter to an available port on a failover communications adapter;
• and
• move the set of clients from the identified communications adapter to the failover communications adapter, wherein the instructions to move each client in the set of clients from the identified communications adapter to the failover communications adapter further cause the processor to:
• send a first event signal to the client indicating that connectivity has temporarily been lost;
• send a command to the identified communications adapter requesting that the identified communications adapter break an existing connection for the client;
• receive an acknowledgement that the identified communications adapter has broken the existing connection;
• send a connection command to the failover communications adapter requesting a new connection for the client;
• receive an acknowledgement that the failover communications adapter has established the new connection;
• and
• send a second event signal to the client indicating that connectivity has been reestablished.