ORA-00245: control file backup failed; target is likely on a local file system

Encounted following error when running RMAN backup in a RAC database :

RMAN-00571: ===========================================================
RMAN-00569: =============== ERROR MESSAGE STACK FOLLOWS ===============
RMAN-00571: ===========================================================
RMAN-03009: failure of Control File and SPFILE Autobackup command on c1 channel at 11/14/2013 00:16:37
ORA-00245: control file backup failed; target is likely on a local file system

From 11gR2 onwards, the controlfile backup happens without holding the controlfile enqueue. For non-RAC database, this doesn't change anything. But for RAC database, due to the changes made to the controlfile backup mechanism in 11gR2, any instance in the cluster may write to the snapshot controlfile. Due to this snapshot controlfile need to be visible to all instances. The snapshot controlfile MUST be accessible by all nodes of a RAC database, if the snapshot controlfile does not reside on a shared device error will be raised at the time of RMAN backup while taking snapshot of controlfile.

Fix
===
configure snapshot controlfile name to '+ORA_ARCH/snapcf_PROD.f';

show snapshot controlfile name;

RMAN> show snapshot controlfile name;

using target database control file instead of recovery catalog
RMAN configuration parameters for database with db_unique_name oralin are:
CONFIGURE SNAPSHOT CONTROLFILE NAME TO '/u01/app/product/oracle/dbs/snapcf_PROD.f'; # default


configure snapshot controlfile name to '+ORA_ARCH/snapcf_PROD.f';

RMAN> configure snapshot controlfile name to '+ORA_ARCH/snapcf_PROD.f';

using target database control file instead of recovery catalog
new RMAN configuration parameters:
CONFIGURE SNAPSHOT CONTROLFILE NAME TO '+ORA_ARCH/snapcf_PROD.f';
new RMAN configuration parameters are successfully stored.

After setting snapshot controlfile to Shared location (diskgroup) all the backups are successful.