|
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index] RE: iFCP vs FCIPHi Folks: The issue is that the design goals and underlying network models are fundamentally different. Essentially, FCIP's goal is to provide a transparent conduit between Fibre Channel fabrics while iFCP's goal is ULP transparency between N_PORTs. As a result, in iFCP, the fabric-wide services provided by FC fabric elements (and often implemented with proprietary protocols) are replaced by standard, IP-based equivalents. For that reason, an iFCP gateway does not need to recognize or provide facilities for servicing inter-switch FC protocols, such as those for zoning, naming and routing. Charles > -----Original Message----- > From: Joshua Tseng [mailto:jtseng@NishanSystems.com] > Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2000 4:08 PM > To: David Robinson; Ips (E-mail) > Subject: RE: iFCP vs FCIP > > > Hi David, > > > > > I am no FCP expert so please correct me if I am wrong. In a pure > > FCP world, there is end-to-end traffic and there is traffic that is > > destined to go between AS's. The primary difference is that there > > is an explicit route to the border gateways in the latter > > case. In both > > the proposals, within the FCP realm the addresses are FCP > based until > > they hit an edge node. In iFCP the destination is > converted to an IP > > address that represents the end node address (which may actually be > > a gateway back into FCP on the other side), in FCIP the request is > > routed to the other AS's FC border gateway and this request is > > encapsulated > > in a TCP request. Given that we are moving between AS's (I > > believe that > > is an assumption in FCIP) can we not use iFCP and instead of > > specifying > > the IP address of the end node, specify the IP address of the > > other AS's > > border gateway since FCP should already be doing some encapsulation > > to route between AS's? > > > > -David > > Up until recently with the creation of the DMP routing protocol, the > concept of AS's (Autonomous Systems, right?) was foreign to Fibre > Channel networking. Most Fibre Channel networks are comprised of just > a handful of switches--the largest FC network I have ever heard of > being deployed is a 15 switch fabric. Perhaps somewhere there are > some fabrics which are bigger, but probably not by much. > (Architecturally, a single Fibre Channel fabric has a maximum capacity > of 239 switches) > > FCIP does not do anything to improve the scalability limits of > the Fibre Channel fabric. All it does is allow extension of the > FC fabric over distances using an IP network. The FCIP gateway is > completely invisible and non-intrusive to the Fibre Channel switches > and does not change or improve the scalability or interoperability > limits of FC fabrics. > > On the other hand, an iFCP gateway actively participates in > switching and routing traffic between FC fabrics and FC devices, by > mapping FC addresses to IP addresses and routing them using standard > IP routing protocols. Using iFCP, a storage network has the same > scalability limits as any other IP network (e.g., IPv4 address space, > etc...). > > Josh >
Home Last updated: Tue Sep 04 01:06:16 2001 6315 messages in chronological order |