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Physical Planning Considerations
5
Benefits of Zoning
Configuring Zones
McDATA Products in a SAN Environment - Planning Manual
5-26
Zones are configured through the SAN management application
(SANavigator 4.2 or EFCM 8.6) by authorizing or restricting access to
name server or route table information (depending on the firmware
release level) associated with device N_Ports that attach to director or
switch fabric ports (F_Ports).
System administrators create zones to increase network security
measures, differentiate between operating systems, and prevent data
loss or corruption by controlling access between devices (such as
servers and data storage units), or between separate user groups
(such as engineering or human resources). Zoning allows an
administrator to establish:
•
Logical subsets of closed user groups. Administrators can
authorize access rights to specific zones for specific user groups,
thereby protecting confidential data from unauthorized access.
•
Barriers between devices that use different operating systems. For
example, it is often critical to separate servers and storage devices
with different operating systems because accidental transfer of
information from one to another can delete or corrupt data.
Zoning prevents this by grouping devices that use the same
operating systems into zones.
•
Groups of devices that are separate from devices in the rest of a
fabric. Zoning allows certain processes (such as maintenance or
testing) to be performed on devices in one group without
interrupting devices in other groups.
•
Temporary access between devices for specific purposes.
Administrators can remove zoning restrictions temporarily (for
example, to perform nightly data backup), then restore zoning
restrictions to perform normal processes.
Zoning is configured through the SAN management application
by authorizing or restricting access to name server or route table
information associated with device N_Ports that attach to director or
switch F_Ports or fabric loop ports (FL_Ports). A device N_Port or
node loop port (NL_Port) can belong to multiple zones. Zoning is
configured by:
•
The eight-byte (64-digit) WWN assigned to the HBA or Fibre
Channel interface installed in the device connected to the director
or fabric switch.
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