Dell Force10 MXL Deployment Manual

Also see for Force10 MXL 10 GbE: Manual Getting started guide Manual 

Contents

Dell Force10 MXL Deployment Manual Manual pdf 68 page image

Deploying FCoE (FIP Snooping) on Dell Force 10 MXL68Appendix A – Basic terminologyCLICommand line interface (CLI). This is the text based telnet, ssh, or serial type interface that will beused for entering commands into the Dell Force10™ MXL model switch. At release the MXL is onlyconfigurable via CLI.CMCChassis management controller (CMC) is the module which controls the Dell PowerEdge™ M1000e bladeserver chassis. Through this controller a telnet, ssh or serial based connection can be used to managethe MXL switch.FIP-SnoopingWith FIP-Snooping enabled on the Dell Force10™ MXL model switch, FIP logins, solicitations, andadvertisements are monitored. In this monitoring or snooping process the switch gathers informationpertaining to the ENode and FCF addresses. With this information the switch will then place filters thatonly allow access to ENode devices that have logged-in successfully. This enables the FCoE VLAN todeny all other traffic except this lossless FCoE storage traffic.The filtering process also secures the end-to-end path between the ENode device and the FCF. TheENode will only be able to talk with the FCF in which it has logged into.FIP-Snooping bridge (FSB)With a switch configured to performing FIP-Snooping the industry term for this switch is FSB or FIP-Snooping bridge. It is performing FIP-Snooping as described in the previous term.FCFFCoE forwarders (FCFs) act as an Ethernet and FC switch combined. All typical termination functionsthat would occur on a FC switch occur on the FCF. FCF’s give VF_Ports and VE_Ports for their virtual FCinterfaces.PFCPriority Flow Control (PFC), or Per-Priority Pause is defined in the IEEE 802.1Qbb standard. PFC is flowcontrol based on priority settings and adds additional information to the standard pause frame. Theadditional fields added to the pause frame allow devices to pause traffic on a specific priority insteadof pausing all traffic. (IEEE, 2009) Pause frames will be initiated by the FCF in most cases when itsreceive buffers are starting to reach a congested point. With PFC traffic is paused instead of droppedand retransmitted. This provides the lossless network behavior necessary for FC packets to beencapsulated and passed along the Ethernet paths.