Glossary

Fibre Connection

FICON. An IBM set of products and services introduced in 1999 that is based on the Fibre Channel Standard. FICON technology uses fiber-optic cables as the data transmission medium, and significantly improves I/O performance (including one Gbps bi-directional data transfer). FICON is designed to coexist with ESCON™ channels, and FICON-to-ESCON control unit connections are supported.

FICON

See Fibre Connection.

FICON Management Server

An optional feature that can be enabled on the director or switch or switch through the Product Manager application. When enabled, host control and management of the director or switch or switch is provided through an S/390 Parallel Enterprise or 2/Series Server attached to a director or switch or switch port.

field-replaceable unit

FRU. Assembly removed and replaced in its entirety when any one of its components fails

(D). See active field-replaceable unit.

file server

A computer that stores data centrally for network users and manages access to that data.

file transfer protocol

FTP. A transmission control protocol/Internet protocol (TCP/IP) -based client/server protocol used to transfer files to and from a remote host. Does not perform any conversion or translation.

firewall

A networking device that blocks unauthorized access to all or parts of a network.

firewall zoning

Hardware enforced access between F_Ports enforced at the source port. The hardware verifies the destination port against the zone defined for the source port.

firmware

Embedded program code that resides and runs on, for example, directors, switches, and hubs.

FLASH memory

Reusable nonvolatile memory that is organized as segments for writing, and as bytes or words for reading. FLASH memory is faster than read-only memory, but slower than random access memory (D).

FLOGI

See fabric login command.