Broadcom Brocade Fabric OS FICON Configuration, 8.1.0 User guide

Supporting Fabric OS 8.1.0

CONFIGURATION GUIDE

Brocade Fabric OS FICON

Conguration Guide, 8.1.0

53-1004394-02

23 July 2018

Copyright

©

Communications Systems LLC. Broadcom, the pulse logo, and Connecting everything are among the trademarks of Broadcom. The term "Broadcom"

refers to Broadcom Inc. and/or its subsidiaries.

Brocade, a Broadcom Inc. Company, reserves the right to make changes without further notice to any products or data herein to improve reliability,

function, or design. Information furnished by Brocade is believed to be accurate and reliable. However, Brocade does not assume any liability arising out of

the application or use of this information, nor the application or use of any product or circuit described herein, neither does it convey any license under its

patent rights nor the rights of others.

The product described by this document may contain open source software covered by the GNU General Public License or other open source license

agreements. To nd out which open source software is included in Brocade products, view the licensing terms applicable to the open source software, and

obtain a copy of the programming source code, please visit https://www.broadcom.com/support/bre-channel-networking/tools/oscd.

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Contents

Preface...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................7

Document Conventions...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................7

Notes, Cautions, and Warnings...................................................................................................................................................................................................7

Text Formatting Conventions.......................................................................................................................................................................................................7

Command Syntax Conventions..................................................................................................................................................................................................8

Brocade Resources...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................8

Contacting Brocade Technical Support............................................................................................................................................................................................ 8

Brocade customers..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................8

Brocade OEM customers............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 9

About This Document..................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11

Supported hardware and software...................................................................................................................................................................................................11

Additional FICON resources.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 11

What's new in this document............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 11

Changes made for the initial release (53-1004394-01)............................................................................................................................................11

Changes made for 53-1004394-02................................................................................................................................................................................. 12

Introducing FICON...........................................................................................................................................................................................................13

FICON overview......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................13

Fabric OS support for FICON..................................................................................................................................................................................................13

Latency guideline...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................14

FICON concepts......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................14

FICON congurations...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................17

Switched point-to-point..............................................................................................................................................................................................................17

Cascaded FICON.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 17

Access control in FICON..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 26

Cascaded zoning........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 27

Error reporting.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................29

Secure access control.................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 29

FICON commands.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................30

Link and FC addressing....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 32

Domain ID.........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................33

Port area............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 33

ALPA...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................33

Administering FICON Fabrics........................................................................................................................................................................................35

User security considerations.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 35

Meeting high-integrity fabric requirements..................................................................................................................................................................................35

Enabling the insistent domain ID............................................................................................................................................................................................ 36

Creating and activating the SCC policy................................................................................................................................................................................ 36

Enabling the fabric-wide consistency policy...................................................................................................................................................................... 37

Enabling High-Integrity Fabric mode....................................................................................................................................................................................37

Using other security commands............................................................................................................................................................................................. 38

Preparing a switch for FICON............................................................................................................................................................................................................38

Cascaded FICON and two-byte addressing considerations.......................................................................................................................................39

Conguring switched point-to-point FICON...............................................................................................................................................................................39

Conguring cascaded FICON........................................................................................................................................................................................................... 44

FCR and FICON cascading................................................................................................................................................................................................................45

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FICON and FICON CUP in Virtual Fabrics..................................................................................................................................................................................45

FICON Logical Switch feature..................................................................................................................................................................................................46

Addressing modes................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 46

Mode 1 (zero-based addressing)............................................................................................................................................................................................47

FICON and blade support for addressing modes........................................................................................................................................................... 47

Port swap limitations.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 47

Disabling and enabling ports - persistent states........................................................................................................................................................................47

Clearing the FICON management database...............................................................................................................................................................................48

Automating CS_CTL mapping..........................................................................................................................................................................................................48

FICON best practices............................................................................................................................................................................................................................50

FICON and FEC-via-TTS.......................................................................................................................................................................................................... 51

Latency guideline....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................52

Conguring FICON CUP................................................................................................................................................................................................ 53

Control Unit Port overview.................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 53

FICON CUP restrictions............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 54

CUP conguration recommendations..................................................................................................................................................................................55

FICON CUP zoning and PDCM considerations.............................................................................................................................................................. 56

Port and switch naming standards for FMS mode...................................................................................................................................................................56

FICON CUP Fabric OS commands......................................................................................................................................................................................56

Conguring FICON CUP.....................................................................................................................................................................................................................57

Disabling ports 0xFE and 0xFF..............................................................................................................................................................................................57

Conguring FICON CUP in Virtual Fabrics........................................................................................................................................................................58

Determining physical port assignment .........................................................................................................................................................................................58

FMS mode and FICON CUP............................................................................................................................................................................................................ 58

Fabric OS command limitations and considerations......................................................................................................................................................59

Displaying FMS mode.................................................................................................................................................................................................................60

Enabling FMS mode.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 60

Disabling FMS mode...................................................................................................................................................................................................................60

FMS mode and FICON 0xFE or 0xFF ports....................................................................................................................................................................60

Upgrade considerations..............................................................................................................................................................................................................61

Port swap limitations.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 61

Mode register bit settings.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 61

FICON le access facility........................................................................................................................................................................................................... 62

Considerations for setting mode register bits....................................................................................................................................................................64

Setting the mode register bits.................................................................................................................................................................................................. 64

Setting the MIHPTO value..................................................................................................................................................................................................................64

Persistently enabling and disabling ports for CUP................................................................................................................................................................... 65

Administering FICON Extension Services.................................................................................................................................................................. 67

Platforms supporting FICON extension over IP........................................................................................................................................................................67

FICON emulation overview................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 67

IBM z/OS Global Mirror emulation........................................................................................................................................................................................68

Tape emulation............................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 70

Teradata emulation........................................................................................................................................................................................................................72

FCIP conguration requirements for FICON extension......................................................................................................................................................... 72

Conguration requirements for switches and directors...........................................................................................................................................................72

High-integrity fabric requirements for cascaded congurations................................................................................................................................72

FICON emulation requirement for a determinate path..................................................................................................................................................73

Conguring FICON emulation...........................................................................................................................................................................................................73

Conguration examples.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 74

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Displaying FICON emulation conguration values......................................................................................................................................................... 74

Modifying FICON emulation..............................................................................................................................................................................................................75

Displaying FICON emulation performance statistics...............................................................................................................................................................75

FICON emulation monitoring...................................................................................................................................................................................................75

Options for displaying statistics...............................................................................................................................................................................................77

Maintaining and Troubleshooting FICON................................................................................................................................................................... 79

Firmware management in a FICON environment.....................................................................................................................................................................79

Upgrade and downgrade considerations.............................................................................................................................................................................79

Firmware download disruption.................................................................................................................................................................................................79

Non-disruptive rmware upload and download................................................................................................................................................................80

Conguration restoration in a FICON environment..................................................................................................................................................................80

Trac Isolation Zoning..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................81

Determining ports for the TI Zone..........................................................................................................................................................................................81

Enhanced TI Zoning..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 82

Monitoring and Alerting Policy Suite.............................................................................................................................................................................................. 88

Port fencing............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 88

Dening port fencing....................................................................................................................................................................................................................88

Settings for FICON environments..........................................................................................................................................................................................89

FICON information.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................89

Link incidents...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................89

Registered listeners.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................90

Node identication data.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 90

FRU error reporting...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 90

Swapping port area IDs........................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 92

Important notes.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 92

Blade swapping........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................92

Common FICON issues...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 93

Troubleshooting FICON.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................95

General information to gather for all cases......................................................................................................................................................................... 95

Switched point-to-point topology checklist........................................................................................................................................................................96

Cascaded topology checklist....................................................................................................................................................................................................96

Gathering additional information.............................................................................................................................................................................................97

Link information............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 97

CUP diagnostics............................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 97

Troubleshooting FICON CUP............................................................................................................................................................................................................97

Troubleshooting NPIV...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................98

Platforms Supporting FICON........................................................................................................................................................................................99

Introduction................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................99

Supported platforms with end-of-support announcements................................................................................................................................................ 99

Currently supported platforms....................................................................................................................................................................................................... 100

Supported Brocade blades..............................................................................................................................................................................................................100

Basic Switch Conguration......................................................................................................................................................................................... 103

Address Binding Examples..........................................................................................................................................................................................107

Sequential address binding..............................................................................................................................................................................................................107

Example scripts for binding ports (Mode 1)....................................................................................................................................................................108

Unbinding multiple ports.................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 112

Conguration Information Record............................................................................................................................................................................. 113

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EBCDIC Code Page.......................................................................................................................................................................................................115

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Preface

• Document Conventions..................................................................................................................................................................................... 7

• Brocade Resources..............................................................................................................................................................................................8

• Contacting Brocade Technical Support.......................................................................................................................................................8

Document Conventions

The document conventions describe text formatting conventions, command syntax conventions, and important notice formats used in

Brocade technical documentation.

Notes, Cautions, and Warnings

Notes, cautions, and warning statements may be used in this document. They are listed in the order of increasing severity of potential

hazards.

NOTE

A Note provides a tip, guidance, or advice, emphasizes important information, or provides a reference to related information.

ATTENTION

An Attention statement indicates a stronger note, for example, to alert you when trac might be interrupted or the device might

reboot.

CAUTION

A Caution statement alerts you to situations that can be potentially hazardous to you or cause damage to hardware,

rmware, software, or data.

DANGER

A Danger statement indicates conditions or situations that can be potentially lethal or extremely hazardous to you. Safety

labels are also attached directly to products to warn of these conditions or situations.

Text Formatting Conventions

Text formatting conventions such as boldface, italic, or Courier font may be used to highlight specic words or phrases.

Format Description

bold text Identies command names.

Identies keywords and operands.

Identies the names of GUI elements.

Identies text to enter in the GUI.

italic text Identies emphasis.

Identies variables.

Identies document titles.

Courier font

Identies CLI output.

Identies command syntax examples.

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Command Syntax Conventions

Bold and italic text identify command syntax components. Delimiters and operators dene groupings of parameters and their logical

relationships.

Convention Description

bold text Identies command names, keywords, and command options.

italic text Identies a variable.

value In Fibre Channel products, a xed value provided as input to a command option is printed in plain text, for

example, --show WWN.

[ ] Syntax components displayed within square brackets are optional.

Default responses to system prompts are enclosed in square brackets.

{ x | y | z } A choice of required parameters is enclosed in curly brackets separated by vertical bars. You must select

one of the options.

In Fibre Channel products, square brackets may be used instead for this purpose.

x | y A vertical bar separates mutually exclusive elements.

< > Nonprinting characters, for example, passwords, are enclosed in angle brackets.

... Repeat the previous element, for example, member[member...].

\ Indicates a “soft” line break in command examples. If a backslash separates two lines of a command

input, enter the entire command at the prompt without the backslash.

Brocade Resources

Visit the Broadcom website and MyBrocade to locate related documentation for your product and additional Brocade resources.

White papers, data sheets, and the most recent versions of Brocade software and hardware manuals are available at www.broadcom.com.

Product documentation for all supported releases is available to registered users at MyBrocade. Log in to my.brocade.com, then click the

Support tab, and select Document Library. You can locate documentation by product or by operating system.

Release notes are bundled with software downloads on MyBrocade. Links to software downloads are available on the MyBrocade landing

page.

Contacting Brocade Technical Support

As a Brocade customer, you can contact Brocade Technical Support 24x7 online or by telephone. Brocade OEM customers should

contact their OEM/solution provider.

Brocade customers

For product support information and the latest information on contacting the Technical Assistance Center, go to http://

www2.brocade.com/en/support/contact-brocade-support.html .

Brocade Resources

Brocade Fabric OS FICON Conguration Guide, 8.1.0

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If you have purchased Brocade product support directly from Brocade, use one of the following methods to contact the Brocade

Technical Assistance Center 24x7.

Online Telephone

Preferred method of contact for non-urgent issues:

• My Cases through MyBrocade

• Software downloads and licensing tools

• Knowledge Base

Required for Sev 1-Critical and Sev 2-High issues:

• North America: 1-800-752-8061 (Toll-free)

• International: 1-408-333-6061 (Not toll-free)

• Toll-free numbers are available in many countries and are listed

on the http://www2.brocade.com/en/support/contact-brocade-

support.html.

Brocade OEM customers

If you have purchased Brocade product support from a Brocade OEM/solution provider, contact your OEM/solution provider for all of

your product support needs.

• OEM/solution providers are trained and certied by Brocade to support Brocade

®

products.

• Brocade provides backline support for issues that cannot be resolved by the OEM/solution provider.

• Brocade Supplemental Support augments your existing OEM support contract, providing direct access to Brocade expertise.

For more information, contact Brocade or your OEM.

• For questions regarding service levels and response times, contact your OEM/solution provider.

Contacting Brocade Technical Support

Brocade Fabric OS FICON Conguration Guide, 8.1.0

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About This Document

• Supported hardware and software..............................................................................................................................................................11

• Additional FICON resources.........................................................................................................................................................................11

• What's new in this document........................................................................................................................................................................11

Supported hardware and software

Although many dierent software and hardware congurations are tested and supported by Brocade Communications Systems, Inc. for

Fabric OS 8.1.0, documenting all possible congurations and scenarios is beyond the scope of this document.

For a complete list of platforms supported by FICON and Fabric OS OS 8.1.0, refer to Introduction on page 99.

In cases where procedures or parts of procedures do not apply to all Brocade hardware platforms, this guide identies which platforms

are supported.

Additional FICON resources

Useful Brocade product resources are available as described in Brocade Resources on page 8. In addition, a dedicated community

resource page for mainframe and FICON information is available at Mainframe & FICON Solutions.

What's new in this document

Changes made for the initial release (53-1004394-01)

The following information was added or changed in this document, in addition to other changes made for accuracy and clarity:

• In FICON concepts on page 14, added additional information about buer credits.

• In Cascaded FICON on page 17, added z14 to the mainframe list.

• In Qualied FICON cascaded congurations on page 19, updated the information to match IBM qualications for Fabric OS

8.1.0.

• In Triangular topology on page 83, added a note clarifying multi-hop support.

• In FICON hops on page 19, added information about hops of no concern and updated the multi-hop information to match

IBM qualications for Fabric OS 8.1.0.

• In FICON commands on page 30, added information about the conCupSet UALERT_type command and the lscfg -con

command.

• In Conguring switched point-to-point FICON on page 39, added 32 Gbps port information.

• In FICON and blade support for addressing modes on page 47, added Brocade X6 Director.

• In FICON and FICON CUP in Virtual Fabrics on page 45, updated allowed Virtual Fabric logical switches allowed on Gen 6

platforms. The FICON Logical Switch feature is introduced. Mode 1 addressing is claried as the supported mode.

• In Mode 1 (zero-based addressing) on page 47, added Linux OS on IBM z Systems and updated the Note to include Brocade

X6 Directors.

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• In FICON CUP restrictions on page 54 and Port and switch naming standards for FMS mode on page 56, Fabric OS 8.1.0

switch and port naming requirements are updated.

• FICON and FEC-via-TTS on page 51 is new information.

• In Upgrade considerations on page 61, Fabric OS 8.1.0 for Gen 6 platforms updated and references to Fabric OS prior to

version 7.0 are removed.

• In Automating CS_CTL mapping on page 48, added information about buer credit use with QoS enabled.

• In Remote tape vaulting topology on page 86, references to System Data Mover (SDM) are removed.

• In Monitoring and Alerting Policy Suite on page 88, added a recommendation not to use SDDQ in a FICON environment.

• In Port fencing on page 88, a note about deprecation of OOP in IBM z/OS is added.

• In Identifying ports on page 89, information about the tag eld content was updated.

• Link information on page 97 is a new section.

• Supported platforms with end-of-support announcements on page 99 is updated.

• Currently supported platforms on page 100 and Supported Brocade blades on page 100 are updated for Fabric OS 8.1.0.

• In Basic Switch Conguration on page 103, iodset command information is updated.

Throughout the document, references to printer emulation are removed. Printer emulation is no longer a supported feature.

Changes made for 53-1004394-02

The following changes were made for this release of book:

• In Triangular topology on page 83, removed conicting content regarding multi-hop paths certication for FICON

congurations. Multi-hop paths are certied for FICON congurations beginning with Fabric OS 7.4.0.

What's new in this document

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Introducing FICON

• FICON overview.................................................................................................................................................................................................13

• FICON concepts................................................................................................................................................................................................14

• FICON congurations......................................................................................................................................................................................17

• Access control in FICON................................................................................................................................................................................26

• FICON commands........................................................................................................................................................................................... 30

• Link and FC addressing..................................................................................................................................................................................32

FICON overview

IBM Fibre Connection (FICON

®

) is an industry-standard, high-speed input/output (I/O) interface for mainframe connections to storage

devices. This guide discusses support oered by Brocade Fabric OS in intermix mode operations, in which FICON and Fibre Channel

technology work together.

For specic information about intermix mode and other aspects of FICON, refer to the IBM Redbook FICON

®

Implementation Guide

(SG24-6497-03) and IBM z System Connectivity Handbook (G24-5444-15).

NOTE

In this guide, the term switch is used to refer to a Brocade switch, backbone, or director unless otherwise noted.

Fabric OS support for FICON

The following Fabric OS standard features support FICON fabrics:

• Blade swapping

Allows you to swap a blade of the same type so that you can replace a eld-replaceable unit (FRU) with minimal trac

disruption. This feature is available for both FICON and open system environments. Blade swapping resolves situations in which

the hardware has failed and the channel congurations cannot be changed quickly. In addition, a blade swap minimizes and

eliminates the need to make changes to the I/O sysgen in the hardware conguration denition (HCD). Blade swapping has

minimal or no impact on other switch features.

• Routing policies

IBM z Systems FICON supports port-based and device-based routing (PBR and DBR). For details on these policies, refer to

the "Routing Trac" chapter in the Brocade Fabric OS Administration Guide.

Check the IBM z Systems qualication letter for information about IBM z Systems FICON support for exchange-based routing

(EBR).

• FICON MIB module

Addresses link incident data for FICON hosts and devices connected to a switch. The FICON MIB module supplements other

Management Information Bases (MIBs) used to manage switches and should be used in conjunction with those other MIBs.

• Insistent Domain ID (IDID)

Disables the dynamic domain ID feature and allows the switch to use only a pre-set domain ID. All switches in a fabric must

have a unique domain ID. An insistent domain ID is required with 2-byte addressing. IDID is the recommended best practice for

single-byte addressing.

• Link incident detection, registration, and reporting

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Provides administrative and diagnostic information.

• Swap port area IDs (PIDs) of physical ports

Redirects resources from a failed port to a healthy port without changing the mainframe hardware conguration denition (HCD)

settings. This feature, also called "port swapping," is available for both FICON and open system environments. Swapping PIDs

on ports resolves situations in which the hardware has failed and the channel congurations cannot be changed quickly. Port

swapping has minimal or no impact on other switch features.

• Switch connection control (SCC) policy

Includes fabric security methods that prevent unauthorized switches from joining a fabric. An SCC policy congured in strict

mode is required for cascaded FICON congurations and whenever 2-byte addressing is used.

• Trac Isolation (TI) zones and enhanced TI zones (EITZ)

TI zones are used to direct trac across links through a specied path. Enhanced TI zones allow you to have ports in more than

one TI Zone and to program domain controller routes to destination domains for F-class trac, ensuring fabric stability.

NOTE

For more detail on these features and conguration procedures, refer to the Brocade Fabric OS Administration Guide.

Brocade management tools provide further support:

• Brocade Network Advisor

Brocade Network Advisor is an optional software program that can be used to manage a fabric that supports FICON and Fibre

Channel Protocol (FCP) devices and trac. Brocade Network Advisor is the recommended GUI management tool for FICON

environments on B-series enterprise-class switches. For more information on Brocade Network Advisor, refer to the manual

appropriate for your version requirements:

– Brocade Network Advisor SAN + IP User Manual

– Brocade Network Advisor SAN User Manual

• Web Tools

Web Tools is an embedded GUI-management tool that can be used to manage a Brocade switch or director that supports

FICON and FCP devices and trac. For more information on Web Tools, refer to the Brocade Web Tools Administration Guide.

Latency guideline

The maximum supported distance for a FICON channel is 300 km (1.5 msec of delay). Synchronous remote data replication for DASD

is generally limited to 100 km (0.5 msec of delay). Asynchronous remote data replication for direct-access storage devices (DASD) and

remote tape reads/writes require that the Brocade Advanced Accelerator for FICON feature be used with FCIP. The Advanced

Accelerator for FICON feature emulates control unit response to the channel to improve the performance over distances greater than

locally attached distances.

FICON concepts

The following gure shows how the trac in a switched point-to-point conguration ows in a FICON environment. The logical path of

the trac is dened as frames moving from the channel to the switch to the control unit. FICON trac moves from a logical partition

(LPAR) and through the channel, through a Fibre Channel link to the switch through the control unit, and ends at the device. This is also

called a channel path, which is a single interface between a central processor and one or more control units along which signals and data

can be sent to perform I/O requests. The channel path uses the logical path to traverse the Fibre Channel fabric. The channel path is

FICON concepts

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dened using an ID called the channel path ID (CHPID). This information is stored in the Input/Output Denition File (IODF) and may be

dynamically congured. The IODF is typically built using the hardware conguration denition (HCD). The trac on the channel path

communicates using the channel command word (CCW) channel for Command Mode FICON and the transport control word (TCW)

channel for z High Performance FICON (zHPF) channel programs.

FIGURE 1 FICON trac

In a FICON environment, buer credits are used at the Fibre Channel Protocol (FCP) level for ow control between optically adjacent

ports, whereas information unit (IU) pacing is the ow control mechanism used by the channel. There are times when there are no more

buer credits to pass back to the other end of the link and a frame pacing delay occurs. The frame pacing delay is the number of

intervals of 2.5 microseconds that a frame had to wait to be transmitted due to a lack of available buer credits. Frame pacing delay

information is reported via the z/OS Resource Measurement Facility (RMF), specically in the FICON Director Activity Report (RMF

74-7).

On the mainframe side, I/O is done on a 2K, or 2,048-byte, page boundary. Even though the maximum size of a FC frame is 2,112

bytes, the mainframe I/O uses 2,048 bytes. Also, when using IBM System z High Performance FICON (zHPF), the average frame size

is seldom more than 1,800 bytes. FICON rarely creates full FC frames. The point is, do not assume that full data frames are always

used. As a result, do not allocate too few buer credits.

FICON introduces the following concepts:

• FICON Control Unit Port (CUP)

The internal port in a switch that assumes a Fibre Channel (FC) address such that it is the FC domain ID (DID) used to direct

FICON trac to the FICON Management Server (FMS).

• Hardware conguration denition (HCD)

FICON concepts

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HCD is an IBM interactive interface application that allows you to dene the hardware conguration for both the processor

channel subsystem and the operating system running on the processor.

• Information unit

A unit of FICON data consisting of from one to four Fibre Channel frames.

• Link Incident Record Registration (LIRR)

The LIRR Extended Link Service (ELS) requests that the recipient add the requesting port to its list of ports that are to receive a

Registered Link Incident Report (RLIR).

• Node

A node is an endpoint that contains information. It can be a computer (host), a device controller, or a peripheral device such as a

DASD array or tape drive. A node has a unique 64-bit identier known as the Node_Name. The Node_Name is typically used

for management purposes.

• Prohibit Dynamic Connectivity Mask (PDCM) and connectivity attributes

PDCM controls whether communication between a pair of ports in the switch is prohibited. Connectivity attributes control

whether the communication is blocked for a port.

• Read Record Set (RRS)

RRS is an IBM channel-initiated CCW command. The command is used in IBM z/OS Global Mirror congurations to read

updates from a volume in an active mirroring session.

• Registered Link Incident Report (RLIR)

RLIR ELS provides a way for a node port to send an incident record to another node port.

• Request Node Identication Data (RNID)

RNID ELS acquires the associated node’s identication data, which provides conguration discovery and management

information.

• Resource Measurement Facility (RMF)

RMF is the performance monitoring component of z/OS that gathers transaction data from the environment and generates

performance reports. All Level II reports, which include port statistics, require the FICON Control Unit Port (CUP) and FICON

Management Server (FMS), the FICON director included in the IOSysGen as a 2032 Control Unit, and the appropriate parmlib

settings congured to enable the RMF 74-7 record generation and statistics collection.

• Systems Operations (SysOps)

SysOps provides the ability to monitor and control all subsystems in a sysplex from any system in the sysplex. This includes

controlled startup, controlled shutdown, and automated recovery of software resources.

• Sysplex

In IBM mainframe computers, a systems complex, commonly called a sysplex, allows multiple processors to be joined into a

single unit, sharing the same sysplex name and couple data sets.

• IPL le

The initial program load (IPL) le, located in nonvolatile storage, contains the current, active conguration settings for the FICON

director. It functions to initialize data on the director during a Power-on Reset (POR) event. When the “Active=Saved” FICON

CUP mode register bit setting is on, any active conguration in switch memory is automatically saved to the IPL le.

FICON concepts

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FICON congurations

There are two types of FICON congurations that are supported using Brocade Fabric OS: switched point-to-point and cascaded

topologies.

Switched point-to-point

A single-switch conguration, called switched point-to-point, allows the channel to use single-byte addressing. The following illustration

shows switched point-to-point between FC and FICON control unit (CU) devices.

FIGURE 2 Switched point-to-point FICON

Cascaded FICON

Cascaded FICON refers to an implementation of FICON that uses one or more FICON channel paths in which the domain ID of the

entry switch is dierent than the domain ID of the switch where the control unit (CU) is attached. Therefore, cascading requires a 2-byte

link address. Anytime a 2-byte link address is dened on a channel, all link addresses associated with that channel must be 2-byte link

addresses.

Switches may be interconnected using the following links:

• Traditional Inter-Switch Links (ISLs)

• Inter-Chassis Links (ICLs)

• Fibre Channel over Internet Protocol (FCIP)

The processor interface is connected to one switch, known as the entry switch, and the storage interface is connected to the other switch.

See the following gure. This conguration is supported for both DASD and tape, with multiple processors, DASD subsystems, and tape

FICON congurations

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subsystems sharing the ISLs or ICLs between the switches and directors. Multiple ISLs between the switches and the directors are also

supported. Cascading between switches and the directors is also supported.

FIGURE 3 Cascaded FICON

A cascaded conguration requires 2-byte addressing. 2-byte addressing requires a list of authorized switches. This authorization feature,

called fabric binding, is available through the Secure Access Control List feature. The fabric binding policy allows a predened list of

switches (domains) to exist in the fabric, and it prevents other switches from joining the fabric. This type of conguration is described in

User security considerations on page 35. The Switch Connection control policy must also be congured in strict mode.

There are hardware and software requirements specic to 2-byte addressing:

• Both FICON switches must be Brocade switches.

• The mainframes must be zArchitecture machines: z114, z196, z800, 890, 900, 990, z9 BC, z9 EC, z10 BC, z10 EC,

zEC12, zBC12, z13, z13s, and z14. Cascaded FICON requires a 64-bit architecture to support the 2-byte addressing

scheme. Cascaded FICON is not supported on 9672 G5/G6 or earlier mainframes.

• z/OS version 1.4 or later, or z/OS version 1.3 with required Program Temporary Fixes (PTFs) and Microcode Loads (MCLs) to

support 2-byte link addressing (DRV3g and MCL [J11206] or later), is required.

• Switch conguration requirements:

– Make sure that E_D_TOV is the same on all switches in the fabric (typically, this is not changed from the default).

– Make sure that R_A_TOV is the same on all switches in the fabric (typically, this is not changed from the default).

FICON congurations

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– Congure insistent Domain ID (IDID).

– Congure fabric binding (strict SCC policy).

FICON hops

With the release of Fabric OS 8.1.0c, Brocade and IBM qualied FICON multi-hop congurations. Initial multi-hop congurations are

limited to three hops with specic congurations. For details on FICON multi-hop, refer to the IBM support website and look for the

white paper WP102704, “FICON Multihop Requirements and Congurations.”

There are congurations that appear to create multi-hop paths, but they are certied by IBM to be “hops of no concern,” as follows:

• In-line inter-chassis links (ICLs) between two or three Gen 5 or Gen 6 directors

• Inter-switch links (ISLs) from a director to a Brocade extension switch, as long as the switch is only providing extension services

and not doing any source-target FCP or FICON switching

Qualied FICON cascaded congurations

Not all bre channel fabrics are qualied for FICON. Cascaded FICON congurations are limited to well-controlled paths. The resulting

fabric scenario after ISL failures must not result in an unsupported conguration. When physical cabling is not practical to enforce these

congurations, zoning or Trac Isolation zoning (TI zoning) with failover disabled may be used to ensure that unsupported fabrics cannot

be formed. Note that these restrictions apply to logical switches and not the chassis.

The following gures show two cascaded congurations. These congurations require Channel A to be congured for 2-byte addressing

and require IDID and fabric binding. It is recommended that there be only two domains in a path from a FICON channel interface to a

FICON control unit interface. There are exceptions to the two-domain rule in extended fabric congurations. Refer to Extended fabric

congurations on page 20 for examples.

FIGURE 4 Cascaded conguration: two switches

The following gure illustrates multiple switches cascaded o of switch 21. As of Fabric OS 8.1.0b, up to three hops are supported from

from channel to control unit.

FICON congurations

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FIGURE 5 Cascaded conguration: core-edge architecture

Extended fabric congurations

Switches in cascaded congurations may be connected through interchassis links (ICLs), interswitch links (ISLs), and FCIP. Connection

using FCIP is through Fibre Channel extension devices, such as Brocade 7840 switches, SX6 blades, and FX8-24 blades. Following are

example congurations.

For more information on long-distance and extended fabrics, refer to the Brocade Fabric OS Administration Guide. For more

information on extension products, including FCIP and IP Extension, refer to the Brocade Fabric OS Extension Conguration Guide.

The following gure illustrates a multi-hop ICL triangle conguration that uses ICLs. Note that three switches are connected through ICLs

only.

FICON congurations

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Broadcom Brocade Fabric OS FICON Configuration, 8.1.0 User guide

Broadcom Brocade Fabric OS FICON Configuration, 8.1.0 User guide

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