Vsans For Ficon And Fcp Mixing; Cisco Mds-Supported Ficon Features - HP Cisco MDS 9020 - Fabric Switch Configuration Manual

Chapter 28 Configuring FICON
S e n d d o c u m e n t a t i o n c o m m e n t s t o m d s f e e d b a c k - d o c @ c i s c o . c o m

VSANs for FICON and FCP Mixing

Cisco MDS 9000 Family FICON-enabled switches simplify deployment of even the most complex
mixed environments. Multiple logical FICON, Z-Series Linux/FCP, and Open-Systems Fibre Channel
Protocol (FCP) fabrics can be overlaid onto a single physical fabric by simply creating VSANs as
required for each service. VSANs provide both hardware isolation and protocol specific fabric services,
eliminating the complexity and potential instability of zone-based mixed schemes.
By default, the FICON feature is disabled in all switches in the Cisco MDS 9000 Family. When the
FICON feature is disabled, FC IDs can be allocated seamlessly. Mixed environments are addressed by
the Cisco SAN-OS software. The challenge of mixing FCP and FICON protocols are addressed by Cisco
MDS switches when implementing VSANs.
Switches and directors in the Cisco MDS 9000 Family support FCP and FICON protocol mixing at the
port level. If these protocols are mixed in the same switch, you can use VSANs to isolate FCP and
FICON ports.
Tip When creating a mixed environment, place all FICON devices in one VSAN (other than the default
VSAN) and segregate the FCP switch ports in a separate VSAN (other than the default VSAN). This
isolation ensures proper communication for all connected devices.

Cisco MDS-Supported FICON Features

The Cisco MDS 9000 Family FICON features include:
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OL-16184-01, Cisco MDS SAN-OS Release 3.x
Flexibility and investment protection—The Cisco MDS 9000 Family shares common switching and
service modules across the Cisco MDS 9500 Series and the 9200 Series.
Refer to the Cisco MDS 9500 Series Hardware Installation Guide and the Cisco MDS 9200 Series
Hardware Installation Guide.
High-availability FICON-enabled director—The Cisco MDS 9500 Series combines nondisruptive
software upgrades, stateful process restart and failover, and full redundancy of all major components
for a new standard in director-class availability. It supports up to 528 autosensing, 4/2/1-Gbps,
10-Gbps, FICON or FCP ports in any combination in a single chassis. See
High Availability."
Infrastructure protection—Common software releases provide infrastructure protection across all
Cisco MDS 9000 platforms. See
VSAN technology—The Cisco MDS 9000 Family provides VSAN technology for
hardware-enforced, isolated environments within a single physical fabric for secure sharing of
physical infrastructure and enhanced FICON mixed support. See
Managing VSANs."
Port-level configurations—There are BB_credits, beacon mode, and port security for each port. See
the "About Buffer-to-Buffer Credits" section on page
on page 12-16, and Chapter 15, "Configuring Trunking."
Alias name configuration—Provides user-friendly aliases instead of the WWN for switches and
attached node devices. See
Comprehensive security framework—The Cisco MDS 9000 Family supports RADIUS and
TACACS+ authentication, Simple Network Management Protocol Version 3 (SNMPv3), role-based
access control, Secure Shell Protocol (SSH), Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP), VSANs,
hardware-enforced zoning, ACLs, fabric binding, Fibre Channel Security Protocol (FC-SP), LUN
Chapter 7, "Software Images."
12-32,
Chapter 23, "Configuring and Managing Zones."
Cisco MDS 9000 Family CLI Configuration Guide
About FICON
Chapter 9, "Configuring
Chapter 19, "Configuring and
"Identifying the Beacon LEDs" section
28-5