Cisco Systems MDS 9000 Active and Full Zone Set Considerations

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Cisco MDS 9000 Family Fabric Manager Configuration Guide
OL-6965-03, Cisco MDS SAN-OS Release 2.x
Chapter 15 Zone Configuration
Zone Set Creation
Note You can specify multiple zone members on multiple lines at the switch prompt.
Tip Zone sets are configured with the names of the member zones. If the zone set is in a configured VSAN,
you must also specify the VSAN.
Active and Full Zone Set Considerations
Before configuring a zone set, consider the following guidelines:
•Each VSAN can have multiple zone sets but only one zone set can be active at any given time.
•When you create a zone set, that zone set becomes a part of the full zone set.
•When you activate a zone set, a copy of the zone set from the full zone set is used to enforce zoning,
and is called the active zone set. An active zone set cannot be modified. A zone that is part of an
active zone set is called an active zone.
•The administrator can modify the full zone set even if a zone set with the same name is active.
•When the activation is done, the active zone set is automatically stored in persistent configuration.
This enables the switch to preserve the active zone set information across switch resets.
•All other switches in the fabric receive the active zone set so they can enforce zoning in their
respective switches.
•Hard and soft zoning are implemented using the active zone set. Modifications take effect during
zone set activation.
•An FC ID or Nx port that is not part of the active zone set belongs to the default zone and the default
zone information is not distributed to other switches.
Note If one zone set is active and you activate another zone set, the currently active zone set is automatically
deactivated. You do not need to explicitly deactivate the currently active zone set before activating a new
zone set.