Switch Manager

Zoning a fabric

Zoning enables you to divide the ports and devices of the fabric into zones for more efficient and secure communication among functionally grouped nodes. This subsection addresses the following topics:

■Zoning concepts, page 45

■Using the Zoning Config dialog box, page 48

■Restoring default zoning, page 48

■Merging fabrics and zoning, page 49

■Using the Edit Zoning dialog box, page 49

■Managing zone sets, page 52

■Managing zones, page 54

■Managing aliases, page 56

■Saving the Zoning Database to a File, page 57

Zoning concepts

The following zoning concepts provide some context for the zoning tasks described in this section:

■Zones

■Aliases

■Zone sets

■Zoning database

■Zoning configuration

Zones

A zone is a named group of ports or devices that can communicate with each other. Devices within a zone can only communicate with other devices in the same zone. A device may participate in more than one zone.

Membership in a zone can be defined by switch domain ID and port number, device Fibre Channel address, or device World Wide Name (WWN).

■WWN entries define zone membership by the World Wide Name of the attached device. With this membership method, you can move WWN member devices to different switch ports in different zones without having to edit the member entry as you would with a domain ID/port number member. Furthermore, unlike FCID members, WWN zone members are not affected by changes in the fabric that could change the Fibre Channel address of an attached device.

■FCID entries define zone membership by the Fibre Channel address of the attached device. With this membership method you can replace a device on the same port without having to edit the member entry as you would with a WWN member.

■Domain ID/Port number entries define zone membership by switch domain ID and port number. All devices attached to the specified port become members of the zone. The specified port must be an F_Port or an FL_Port.