Abstract: A method and system for booting a server and/or server blade in a network is provided. The system includes, a boot server that is used to store plural WWPNs, an active profile for the server and a boot schedule, wherein a HBA registers a default WWPN and/or HBA profile with the boot server and if the HBA is configured to boot using a management application, the boot server provides a WWPN to the HBA. The management application includes, a graphical user interface for creating a LUN for a storage system and assigning the LUN to be a boot LUN, wherein the graphical user interface can access a boot server for booting a server.

Abstract: A method and a Fibre Channel switch element are provided that allows communication between a host system and a target device attached to a proprietary switch fabric in a network. The Fibre Channel switch element includes a first port that communicates with the target device through the proprietary switch fabric by logging on behalf of the host system so that the proprietary switch behaves as if it was directly communicating with the host system; and a second port that communicates with the host system and collects host bus adapter (“HBA”) identification information, wherein the HBA identification information is used to map the first port to the second port so that when the host system communicates with the target device the Fibre Channel switch element is transparent to the proprietary switch fabric.

Abstract: A method and system for routing fibre channel frames using a fibre channel switch element is provided. The switch element includes, a hashing module whose output is used to select the column from a look up table to route frames. The method includes, indexing a look up table using domain, area, virtual storage area network identifier, a hashing module output and/or AL_PA values; selecting a column from the look up table based on a column select signal; and routing a frame if a route is valid. The hashing module takes a fibre channel header to generate a pseudo random value used for selecting a column from the look up table. The hashing module uses same field values in an exchange to generate the pseudo random value. A hash function is used on a frame's OX_ID, D_ID, S_ID, and/or RX_ID to route fibre channel frames.