Fibre channel over ethernet (FCoE) zoning in a distributed ethernet switch

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9774546-B2
Application number	US-201414481625-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 9, 2014
Priority date	May 14, 2014
Publication date	Sep 26, 2017
Grant date	Sep 26, 2017

Abstract

Method to perform an operation comprising, receiving a login request from an endpoint connected to first physical port of a first switch module of a distributed network switch, wherein the distributed network switch comprises a plurality of switch modules, wherein each switch module comprises a plurality of ASICs, responsive to the login request, storing, in a FCDF database, an entry comprising an identifier of the first physical port and a unique identifier of the endpoint, and responsive to receiving, from a cFCF, a zoning update comprising the unique identifier of the endpoint and an FCID for the endpoint, storing the FCID in the FCDF database entry for the endpoint, identifying a first ASIC, of the plurality of ASICs of the first switch module, connected to the first physical port, and updating a zoning table of the first ASIC to include the zoning update.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method, comprising:
receiving a login request from an endpoint connected to a first physical port of a first switch module of a distributed network switch, wherein the distributed network switch comprises a plurality of switch modules, wherein each switch module comprises a plurality of application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs);
in response to the login request, storing, in a Fibre Channel Data Forwarder (FCDF) database, an entry comprising an identifier of the first physical port and a unique identifier of the endpoint; and
responsive to receiving, from a controlling Fibre Channel Forwarder (cFCF), a zoning update comprising the unique identifier of the endpoint and a Fibre Channel Identifier (FCID) for the endpoint:
storing the FCID in the FCDF database entry for the endpoint;
identifying a first ASIC, of the plurality of ASICs of the first switch module, connected to the first physical port; and
updating a zoning table of the first ASIC to include the zoning update.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein each ASIC of each switch module includes a zoning table for each physical port connected to each ASIC, wherein each zoning table comprises a plurality of entries specifying a pair of endpoints permitted to communicate, and wherein the plurality of entries specifies a respective FCID of each endpoint.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein a plurality of zones are defined in the distributed network switch, wherein the endpoint is a member of a first zone of the plurality of zones.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein updating the zoning table comprises:
identifying a first zoning entry to add to the zoning table; and
upon determining that a second zoning entry in the zoning table is to be deleted from the zoning table, overwriting the second zoning entry with the first zoning entry.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the endpoint comprises a first endpoint, wherein the method further comprises:
identifying, in the zoning update, a second endpoint permitted to communicate with the first endpoint, wherein the second endpoint is connected to a second physical port of at least one of: (i) the first switch module, and (ii) a second switch module; and
updating the zoning table of a second ASIC of the second physical port to reflect that the first endpoint is permitted to communicate with the second endpoint.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the zoning tables of the first and second ASICs are updated in parallel.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the login request comprises a fabric login (FLOGI) frame, wherein the zoning update comprises an N_Port_ID and Zoning ACL Distribution (NPZD).

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein each ASIC of each switch module includes a zoning table for each physical port connected to each ASIC.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein each zoning table comprises a plurality of entries specifying a pair of endpoints permitted to communicate.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein a plurality of zones are defined in the distributed network switch.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein updating the zoning table comprises identifying a first zoning entry to add to the zoning table.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein updating the zoning table further comprises determining that a second zoning entry in the zoning table is to be deleted from the zoning table.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein updating the zoning table comprises overwriting a first zoning entry with a second zoning entry in the zoning table.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the endpoint comprises a first endpoint, wherein the method further comprises identifying, in the zoning update, a second endpoint permitted to communicate with the first endpoint.

15. The method of claim 14 , further comprising updating the zoning table of a second ASIC of the second physical port to reflect that the first endpoint is permitted to communicate with the second endpoint.

16. The method of claim 15 , wherein the zoning tables of the first and second ASICs are updated in parallel.

17. The method of claim 14 , wherein the second endpoint is connected to a second physical port of the first switch module.

18. The method of claim 14 , wherein the second endpoint is connected to a second physical port of a second switch module.

19. The method of claim 1 , wherein the login request comprises a fabric login (FLOGI) frame.

20. The method of claim 1 , wherein the zoning update comprises an N_Port_ID and Zoning ACL Distribution (NPZD).

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Fenkes Joachim
• May Henry J
• Raisch Christoph
• Roscher Stefan
• Schmidt Alexander
• Sentler Daniel

Classifications

• H04L45/745

  Address table lookup; Address filtering · CPC title

• H04L49/351

  for local area network [LAN], e.g. Ethernet switches · CPC title

• H04L49/25 Primary

  Routing or path finding in a switch fabric · CPC title

• H04L12/6418 Primary

  Hybrid transport · CPC title