2009-01-30 22:05:47

by Patrick J. LoPresti

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Subject: Fibre Channel without SCSI?

I am interested in experimenting with Fibre Channel at a low level
(layer FC-2), preferably using off-the-shelf hardware.

But as near as I can tell browsing the Linux source, Fibre Channel and
SCSI seem to be joined at the hip.

Questions:

- Is there a user-space interface to access the raw Fibre Channel
protocol via an ordinary HBA?

- If not, are the kernel internals such that doing this from kernel
space would be relatively straightorward?

- Or is this just a bad idea?

Again, my goal is to bypass the SCSI protocol entirely. Put another
way, I want to implement my own upper-level protocol on top of FC-2,
but without having to re-write an entire HBA driver.

Any pointers (however brief) or redirection to a more appropriate
forum would be appreciated.

Thank you!

- Pat