Chapter 1 8 Configuring Fabric Configuration Servers; Configuring Fabric Configuration Servers; Information About Fcs - Cisco Nexus 5000 Series Configuration Manual

Configuring Fabric Configuration Servers

This chapter contains the following sections:
•
Configuring Fabric Configuration Servers

Information About FCS

The Fabric Configuration Server (FCS) provides discovery of topology attributes and maintains a repository
of configuration information of fabric elements. A management application is usually connected to the FCS
on the switch through an N port. The FCS views the entire fabric based on the following objects:
• Interconnect element (IE) object—Each switch in the fabric corresponds to an IE object. One or more
• Port object—Each physical port in an IE corresponds to a port object. This includes the switch ports (xE
• Platform object—A set of nodes may be defined as a platform object to make it a single manageable
Each object has its own set of attributes and values. A null value may also be defined for some attributes.
In the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch environment, a fabric may consist of multiple VSANs. One instance
of the FCS is present per VSAN.
FCS supports the discovery of virtual devices. The fcs virtual-device-add command, entered in FCS
configuration submode, allows you to discover virtual devices in a particular VSAN or in all VSANs.
If you have attached a management application to a switch, all the frames directed towards the FCS in the
switch are part of the port VSAN in the switch port (F port). Your view of the management application is
limited only to this VSAN. However, information about other VSANs that this switch is part of can be obtained
either through the SNMP or CLI.
In the following figure, Management Application 1 (M1) is connected through an F port with port VSAN ID
1, and Management Application 2 (M2) is connected through an F port with port VSAN ID 2. M1 can query
OL-xxxxx-xx
Configuring Fabric Configuration Servers, page 243
IE objects form a fabric.
and F ports) and their attached N ports.
entity. These nodes are end-devices (host systems, storage subsystems) attached to the fabric. Platform
objects reside at the edge switches of the fabric.
C H A P T E R
Cisco Nexus 5000 Series NX-OS SAN Switching Configuration Guide
18
243