HP A7533A, AE370A, StorageWorks 4/32 User Manual
STORAGE AREA NETWORK
Brocade SAN Glossary
A
ABTS Abort Basic Link Service.
ACC Accept link service reply; the normal reply to an Extended Link Service
request (such as FLOGI), indicating that the request has been completed.
Access fairness A process by which contending nodes are guaranteed access to an
Arbitrated Loop.
Access method The method used to access a physical medium in order to transmit data.
ACK Acknowledgement frame. Used for end-to-end flow control; verifies receipt of
one or more frames from Class 1, 2 or F services.
Active copper A Fibre Channel connection that allows copper cabling up to 33 m (108 ft) in
length between devices.
Adaptive Networking A suite of fabric services introduced in Fabric OS 6.0 that employ deep fabric
intelligence to anticipate congestion and to dynamically make adjustments
in the fabric so that application traffic continues to flow. See also QoS,
Ingress Rate Limiting, and Traffic Isolation.
AD0 A special administrative domain. When an AD-capable switch is first added
to a fabric, all relevant resources of the fabric (switches, ports, devices)
become its members automatically. These resources are put in an implicit
list as defined later. When members are added to AD0 explicitly they become
part of the explicit list as fixed members.
AD255 An administrative domain that allows users to get an unfiltered view of the
fabric and manage ADs. Corresponds to the legacy physical fabric in a nonAD aware fabric.
AD zone database The zone database owned by each AD. Once Fabric OS 5.2.0 and later is
installed, the root zone database will be owned by AD0, and each AD will
have its own zone database.
Address identifier A 24-bit number used to indicate the link-level address of communicating
devices. In a frame header, the address identifier indicates the source ID
(S_ID) and the destination ID (D_ID) of the frame respectively.
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Administrative Domain (AD)
Part of Brocade’s virtual fabric strategy, a filtered administrative view of the
fabric. The logical view presented in an AD filters attributes of switch ports
and end devices based on AD membership. ADs allow device resources in a
fabric to be grouped together and provide the ability to manage them
separately.
Advanced zoning In EZSwitchSetup, a zoning option that allows you to customize zoning and is
appropriate for SAN administrators who have the experience to perform
manual zoning.
Alias server A proposed standard as part of FC-GS-3; it will use the well-known address
FFFFF8 and will maintain identifier mappings to support multicast group
management
AL_PA Arbitrated Loop Physical Address. An 8-bit value used to identify a device
participating in an Arbitrated Loop.
AL_TIME Arbitrated Loop Timeout value. Twice the amount of time it would take for a
transmission word to propagate around a worst-case loop. The default value
is 15 milliseconds (ms).
ANSI American National Standards Institute. Governing body for standards
in the U.S.
ARB Arbitrative Primitive Signal. Applies only to an Arbitrated Loop topology, and
is transmitted as the fill word by an L_Port to indicate the port is arbitrating
access to the loop.
Arbitrated Loop A shared 100/200-megabytes-per-second Fibre Channel transport
supporting up to a maximum of 126 devices and 1 attachment to a fabric.
Ports with lower AL_PAs have higher priorities.
Arbitration A method of gaining orderly access to a shared-loop topology.
ARP Address Resolution Protocol. A TCP/IP function for associating an IP address
with a link-level address.
ASIC Application-Specific Integrated Circuit.
ATM Asynchronous Transfer Mode. A high-speed packet-switching transport used
for transmitting data over LANs or WANs that transmits fixed-length units of
data. It provides any-to-any connectivity and nodes can transmit
simultaneously.
Audit event Fabric OS event that is logged.
Authentication The process of verifying through a password that an entity in a fabric, such
as a switch, should or should not have access to the fabric.
Autoleveling A process run on embedded switches (also called “blades”) that is triggered
when the active CP detects that the blade contains a different version of the
firmware, regardless of which version is older. Autoleveling downloads the
firmware to the embedded switch, swaps partitions, reboots the switch, and
copies the new firmware from the primary partition to the secondary
partition.
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AW_TOV Arbitration Wait Timeout Value. The minimum time an arbitrating L_Port
waits for a response before beginning loop initialization.
B
Backbone fabric A Fibre Channel fabric that enables scalable metaSANs by allowing the
networking of multiple FC routers connected to the backbone fabric via
E_Port interfaces. Devices attached to Multiprotocol Routers via F_Port or
FL_Port, or imported via the iSCSI Gateway Service, are also considered part
of the backbone.
Bandwidth The transmission capacity of the cable, link, or system.
BB_Credit Buffer-to-buffer credit; used to determine how many frames can be sent to
the recipient.
Beacon A tool in which all of the port LEDs on a switch are set to flash from one side
of the switch to the other to enable identification of an individual switch in a
large fabric.
BER Bit Error Rate. The rate at which bits are expected to be received in error.
Expressed as a ratio of error bits to total bits transmitted.
Bit synchronization The condition is which a receiver is delivering retimed serial data at a
required bit error rate.
Bloom The code name given to the third-generation Brocade 2 Gbit/sec ASIC. This
ASIC is used in Brocade switches 3000 series and beyond.
Broadcast Sending a transmission to all Nx_Ports on a fabric.
Boot code Software that initialized the system environment during the early phase of
the boot up process. For example, boot code may determine the amount of
available memory and how to access it.
Boot flash Flash (temporary) memory that stores the boot code and boot parameters.
Brocade Data Migration Manager (DMM)
Brocade application that provides hardware-assisted data migration from
one storage device to another across a Brocade switch; enables the
migration of data from multiple storage devices simultaneously across
multiple fabrics; layered on the Brocade Storage Application Services (SAS).
Brocade DCX Backbone A backbone-class platform designed to operate at the core of the Brocade
Data Center Fabric (DCF). The Brocade DCX enables massive consolidation,
multi-protocol integration, and simplified management to dramatically
reduce operational and capital costs. It provides true interoperability with
existing SANs. See also Adaptive Networking and data center fabric.
Brocade Fabric Manager (FM)
Optionally licensed Brocade application that resides on a host computer and
enables fabric-wide management for multiple fabrics in a geographicallydispersed location via a graphical user interface.
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Brocade Enterprise Fabric Connectivity Manager (EFCM)
Optionally licensed Brocade software that provides easy, centralized
management of a SAN and quick access to all device configuration
applications.
Brocade Web Tools Optionally licensed software component of Fabric OS that enables
administrators to monitor and manage single or small fabrics, switches, and
ports from a standard workstation.
Broadcast zone In Fabric OS 5.3.0 or later, a zone with the name of “broadcast” (case-
sensitive), which is used for setting up recipients of broadcast packets. Does
not restrict access to its members, but restricts broadcast packets to only
those devices that are members.
Buffer-to-buffer flow control
Management of the frame transmission rate in either a point-to-point
topology or in an Arbitrated Loop.
Bypass circuitry Circuits that automatically remove a device from the data path when valid
signals are dropped.
C
CAM Content-Addressable Memory.
Cascade Connecting two or more Fibre Channel hubs or switches to increase port
capacity or distance. Seven levels of cascading is the limit for Brocade
switches. Brocade 1000 switches can have up to 32 in a SAN; Brocade
2000 switches and above can have up to 239.
CDR Clock and Data Recovery circuitry.
CE Conformité Européenne.
Channel A point-to-point link whose task is to transport data from one point to
another.
CHAP Challenge-Handshake Authentication Protocol. Allows remote servers and
clients to securely exchange authentication credentials. Both the server and
client are configured with the same shared secret.
CIM Common Information Model; a management structure enabling disparate
resources to be managed by a common application.
Class 1 A connection-oriented class of service that requires acknowledgment of
frame delivery.
Class 2 A connectionless class of service that requires acknowledgment of frame
delivery.
Class 3 A connectionless class of service that requires no acknowledgment of frame
delivery between N_Ports.
Class 4 A connection-oriented service that allows fractional parts of the bandwidth to
be used in a virtual circuit.
Class 6 A connection-oriented, multicast service geared toward video broadcasts
between a central server and clients.
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Class F A connectionless class of service that gives notification of delivery or non-
delivery between E_Ports, used for control, coordination, and configuration
of the fabric.
CLS Close Primitive Signal. Only in an Arbitrated Loop; sent by an L_Port that is
currently communicating on the loop, to close communication to another
L_Port.
Controlled port A port that fulfils one of the following conditions: a) is a member of an AD,
either explicitly assigned or part of AD0 or b) the switch to which the port
belongs is a member of an AD.
Community A relationship in SNMP between an SNMP agent and a set of SNMP
managers that defines authentication, access control, and proxy
characteristics.
Compact flash Flash (temporary) memory that is used in a manner similar to hard disk
storage. It is connected to a bridging component which connects to the PCI
bus of the processor. Not visible within the processor's memory space.
Condor The code name given to the Brocade 4 Gbit/sec ASIC. This ASIC is used in
Brocade switches and directors.
Congestion The realization of the potential of over-subscription. A congested link is one
on which multiple devices actually are contending for bandwidth.
Controller A computer module that interprets signals between a host and a peripheral
device. The controller typically is part of the peripheral device.
Core PID The default PID mode for Brocade 200E, 3016, 3250, 3850, 3900, and
4100 switches and Brocade directors. It uses the entire 8-bit address space
and directly uses the port number as the area_ID.
COS Class of service.
CRC Cyclic Redundancy Check. A self-test for error detection and correction.
Credit A numeric value that represents the maximum number of receive buffers
provided by an F/FL_Port to its attached N/NL_Port such that the N/NL_Port
can transmit frames without overrunning the F/FL_Port.
CRU Customer Replaceable Unit. A component that can, upon failure, be replaced
by an end user.
Cut-through A switching technique that allows a routing decision to be made as soon as
the destination address of the frame is received.
D
D_ID Destination identifier; a 3-byte field in the frame header used to indicate the
address identifier of the N_Port to which the frame is headed.
Dark fiber A leased fiber optic cable running between sites characterized by not having
a service provided on the wire by the leasing company; all services are
provided by the customer.
DAS Direct-Attached Storage.
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Data center fabric The hardware, software, and infrastructure required to power data centers.
Includes concepts such as converged protocols, extended physical
connectivity, virtual partitions, fabric services, and extending data
management policies into the fabric. See also Adaptive Networking.
Data Migration Console The graphical user interface for the Brocade Data Migration Manager
appliance.
Data Migration Manager See Brocade Data Migration Manager.
Datagram A Class 3 Fibre Channel service that allows data to be sent quickly to devices
attached to the fabric, with no confirmation of receipt.
DCC Direct cable connection; does not require network interface cards (NICs),
making it relatively simple and inexpensive; however, it provides a limited
connection between two PCs and the data transfer rate is slower compared
to a true LAN.
Dedicated simplex A means that permits a single N_Port to simultaneously initiate a session
with another N_Port as an initiator, and have a separate Class 1 connection
to another N_Port as a recipient.
Deskew In the Brocade trunking feature, the time difference between the traffic
traveling over each ISL other than the shortest ISL in the group and the
traffic traveling over the shortest ISL. The deskew number corresponds to
nanoseconds divided by 10. The firmware automatically sets the minimum
deskew value of the shortest ISL to 15.
Device-based routing A routing policy in which the choice of routing path is based on the FC
address of the source device (S-ID) and the destination device (D_ID),
improving path utilization for better performance.
DH-CHAP Diffie-Hellman Challenge-Handshake Authentication Protocol; an
implementation of CHAP using Diffie-Hellman encryption.
DHCP Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol. An Internet protocol for automating the
configuration of computers that use TCP/IP; can be used to automatically
assign IP addresses, to deliver TCP/IP stack configuration parameters, such
as subnet mask and default router, and to provide other configuration
information, such as the addresses for printer, time, and news servers.
DHCPD Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol daemon.
DID Destination ID with three fields: Domain ID (DD), Area ID (AA), and AL_PA
(PP). SID/DID traffic prioritization is a licensed feature introduced in Fabric
OS 6.0 that allows you to categorize the traffic flow into high, medium, or
low priority. Requires an Adaptive Networking license on every switch in
the path between a given configured device pair. See also QoS.
Digital certificate An electronic document issued by a CA (certificate authority) to an entity,
containing the public key and identity of the entity.
Director A highly available and scalable Fibre Channel switch that uses a chassis and
blade architecture; current models are Brocade 24000 Director and Brocade
48000 Director.
Discovery domain An iSCSI access control concept; created between iSCSI hosts and targets
using their IQN.
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Disparity The relationship of 1s and 0s in an encoded character; positive disparity
contains more 1s, negative disparity contains more 0s, neutral disparity
contains an equal number of 1s and 0s.
DLS Dynamic Load Sharing. Allows for recomputing of routes when an Fx_Port or
E_Port comes up or down.
Domain ID A unique number between 1 and 239 on a Brocade 2000 Series or later
switch that identifies the switch to a fabric.
Dynamic Ports On Demand (DPOD)
Automatically enables ports on an embedded blade when the server is
powered on and does not require a predefined assignment of port;
determined by the total number of ports in use and the number of
purchased dynamic ports.
DWDM Dense Wave Division Multiplexing..Allows more wavelengths to use the same
fiber. See WDM.
E
8b/10b encoding An encoding scheme that converts an 8-bit byte into one or two possible 10-
bit characters; used for balancing 1s and 0s in high-speed transports.
ECCN Export Classification Control Number. A government classification of
encryption, for example, SSH is in the high-encryption category and therefore
has certain restrictions regarding its transfer.
Edge fabric A Fibre Channel fabric connected to an FC router via an EX_Port (where
hosts and storage are typically attached in a metaSAN).
E_D_TOV Error-Detect Time Out Value. The maximum round-trip time that an operation
could require before declaring an error condition.
Effective zone configuration
A subset of the defined zone configuration, containing only the zone
configuration objects that are currently enabled; only one configuration can
be active at a time, but multiple configurations can be defined in the
database.
EE_Credit End-to-End Credit. Used to manage the exchange of frames by two
communicating devices and set the maximum number of frames that may
remain unacknowledged.
Enterprise Fabric Connectivity Manager (EFCM)
See Brocade Enterprise Fabric Connectivity Manager.
E_Port A standard Fibre Channel mechanism that enables switches to network with
each other.
EIA Electronic Industries Association.
ELP Exchange Link Parameters.
ELS Extend Link Service. Sent to the destination N_Port to perform the requested
function or service. ELS is a Fibre Channel standard sometimes referenced
as “Fibre Channel Physical (FC_PH) ELS.”
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Enabled zone configuration
The currently enabled configuration of zones; only one configuration can be
enabled at a time.
Entry Fabric The basic Brocade software license that allows one E_Port per switch.
EOF End of Frame. A group of ordered sets used to mark the end of a frame.
Exchange The highest-level Fibre Channel mechanism used for communication
between N_Ports, composed of one or more related sequences and working
either uni- or bi-directionally.
Exported device A device that has been mapped between fabrics (a host or storage port in
one edge fabric can be exported to any other fabric by using LSAN zoning).
EX_Port The type of E_Port used to connect a Multiprotocol Router to an edge fabric.
An EX_Port follows standard E_Port protocols and supports FC-NAT but does
not allow fabric merging across EX_Ports.
Extended edge PID Format that generates the same PID for a port on switches with 16 or fewer
ports as would native PID format, but it also supports up to 256 ports per
domain.
Extended Fabrics Optionally licensed Fabric OS feature that provides up to 500 km of switched
fabric connectivity at full bandwidth over long distance.
Extent A range of logical blocks within a logical unit (LU); the path name identifies
both the LU of which the extent is part and the path used to access this
extent.
F
Fabric A collection of Fibre Channel switches and directors and connected devices,
such as hosts and storage.
Fabric Application Platform
A device that enables fabric-based storage applications such as mirroring,
data migration, snapshots, and virtual tape. The Brocade Fabric Application
Platform can run in a central location, process data at wire-speed, and
reside in existing data paths.
Fabric ID (FID) Unique identifier of a fabric in a metaSAN.
Fabric Manager See Brocade Fabric Manager.
Fabric port count The number of ports available for connection by nodes in a fabric.
Fabric topology The arrangement of switches that form a fabric.
Fabric Watch Optionally licensed Brocade software accessed through either the command-
line interface or Brocade Web Tools; provides the ability to set thresholds for
monitoring fabric conditions.
Failover On a Brocade device, the process of activating the standby CP and
transferring switch processing from the active CP so that traffic is not
disrupted.
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FAN 1) Fabric Address Notification. Keeps the AL_PA and fabric address when
loop re-initializes if the switch supports FAN.
2) File Area Network. The set of systems and software that enable
centralized management of file data to improve user and administrative
efficiency.
Fan-in The ratio of hosts to storage devices. It is the view of the SAN from the
storage port's perspective.
Fan-out The ratio of storage devices to hosts. It is the view of the SAN from the host
port's perspective.
FastWrite A Fabric OS feature running on top of FCIP that accelerates Write operations
from a host to a target device; eliminates the latency associated with long
distance in FCIP.
F_BSY Fabric Port Busy Frame. A frame issued by the fabric to indicate that a frame
cannot be delivered because the fabric or destination N_Port is busy.
FCA Fibre Channel Association.
FC-0 Lowest layer on Fibre Channel transport; represents the physical media.
FC-1 This layer contains the 8b/10b encoding scheme.
FC-2 This layer handles framing and protocol, frame format, sequence/exchange
management, and ordered set usage.
FC-3 This layer contains common services used by multiple N_Ports in a node.
FC-4 This layer handles standards and profiles for mapping upper-level protocols
such as SCSI and IP onto the Fibre Channel Protocol.
FC-AL Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop.
FC-AV Fibre Channel Audio Visual.
FC-CT Fibre Channel Common Transport.
FC-FC Routing Service A service that extends hierarchical networking capabilities to Fibre Channel
fabrics. It enables devices located on separate fabrics to communicate
without merging the fabrics. It also enables the creation of LSANs.
FC-FG Fibre Channel Generic requirements.
FC-FLA Fibre Channel Fabric Loop Attachment.
FC-FS Fibre Channel Framing and Signaling.
FC-GS Fibre Channel Generic Services.
FC-GS-2 Second-generation Fibre Channel Generic Services.
FC-GS-3 Third-generation Fibre Channel Generic Services.
FCIP Fibre Channel over IP protocol.
FCoE Fibre Channel over 10 Gbit/sec Ethernet networks.
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