Fibre channel switching fabric
DCFirst Claim
1. A fibre channel switch having a plurality of ports for routing received frames having fields between multiple attached devices comprising:
- multiple port control modules for receiving frames from and transmitting frames to the attached devices, route determination apparatus for selecting a route between the port control modules, connectivity apparatus coupled to the route determination apparatus and to the port control module for effecting transfer of frames between the ports, and apparatus in each of the multiple port control modules for generating fabric reject frames or fabric busy frames upon certain predefined conditions, the apparatus comprising;
a register for receiving at least certain of the fields or the received frame for possible modification to fabric reject or fabric busy, and a hardware state machine which receives an indication of whether to modify a received frame into a fabric reject frame or a fabric busy frame and generates one or more outputs to select between modification of the frame to a fabric reject frame or a fabric busy frame, or to maintain the fields as received in the register.
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Abstract
The Fibre Channel standard was created by the American National Standard for Information Systems (ANSI) X3T11 task group to define a serial I/O channel for interconnecting a number of heterogeneous peripheral devices to computer systems as well as interconnecting the computer systems themselves through optical fiber and copper media at gigabit speeds (i.e., one billion bits per second). Multiple protocols such as SCSI (Small Computer Serial Interface), IP (Internet Protocol), HIPPI, ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) among others can concurrently utilize the same media when mapped over Fibre Channel. A Fibre Channel Fabric is an entity which transmits Fibre Channel frames between connected Node Ports. The Fibre Channel fabric routes the frames based on the destination address as well as other information embedded in the Fibre Channel frame header. Node Ports are attached to the Fibre Channel Fabric through links.
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Citations
59 Claims
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1. A fibre channel switch having a plurality of ports for routing received frames having fields between multiple attached devices comprising:
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multiple port control modules for receiving frames from and transmitting frames to the attached devices, route determination apparatus for selecting a route between the port control modules, connectivity apparatus coupled to the route determination apparatus and to the port control module for effecting transfer of frames between the ports, and apparatus in each of the multiple port control modules for generating fabric reject frames or fabric busy frames upon certain predefined conditions, the apparatus comprising;
a register for receiving at least certain of the fields or the received frame for possible modification to fabric reject or fabric busy, and a hardware state machine which receives an indication of whether to modify a received frame into a fabric reject frame or a fabric busy frame and generates one or more outputs to select between modification of the frame to a fabric reject frame or a fabric busy frame, or to maintain the fields as received in the register. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 48)
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43. A fibre channel switch for routing Fibre Channel Frames between multiple attached devices supporting at least connectionless based service between attached devices, comprising:
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multiple port control modules, the port control module being adapted for connection to an attached device, a router for routing Fibre Channel Frames, the router including registers for holding blocked route requests and a hardware finite state machine which causes the registers to dequeue the blocked route requests upon predefined conditions, the router being in communication with the port control modules, and a switch core including a crossbar for support of connectionless based service for routing Fibre Channel Frames between attached devices. - View Dependent Claims (44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 50)
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51. A fibre channel switch for connecting multiple attached devices which sends fabric reject (F_RJT) and fabric busy (F_BSY) frames upon predefined conditions between attached devices, comprising:
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multiple port control modules, the port control module being adapted for connection to an attached device, a router, the router being in communication with the port control modules to receive route requests and to generate route responses and to provide the route responses to the port control modules, the router comprising a route determination module which receives an input route request and route state information and determines the routing response, the router including redefined F_RJT and F_BSY action and reason codes, and if the response is a fabric reject or fabric busy, providing an output signal to select the specific action and reason codes and store the selected action and reason codes in a hardware register, and a switch core disposed between the port control modules and coupled to the router.
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52. A fibre channel switch for connecting multiple attached devices, through Fibre Channel links with differing speeds, comprising:
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multiple port control modules, the port control modules being adapted for connection to an attached device through a Fibre Channel link, the port control modules adapted to operate with a plurality of different speed links, storage to contain information on the link speed associated with the port control modules, a router, the router supporting connection requests from port control modules supporting Fibre Channel links of differing speeds, including a control system, coupled to the storage, for comparing link speeds of the port control modules, and for providing an indication if the link speed of the incoming port control module is less than the link speed of the destination port control module, and connectivity apparatus coupled to the router and to the port control modules for effecting transfer of frames between the ports. - View Dependent Claims (53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59)
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Specification