Data Center Fabric Manager Enterprise User Manual v10.3.X (53-1001357-01, November 2009)

DCFM Enterprise User Manual 195

53-1001357-01

Port fencing

Port Fencing allows you to protect your SAN from repeated operational or security problems

experienced by ports. Use Port Fencing to set threshold limits for the number of specific port events

permitted during a given time period on the selected object.

Port Fencing objects include the SAN, Fabrics, Directors, Switches (physical), Virtual Switches,

Ports, as well as Port Types (E_port, F_port, and FX_port). Use Port Fencing to directly assign a

threshold to these objects. When a switch does not support Port Fencing, a “No Fencing Changes”

message displays in the Threshold field in the Ports table.

If the port detects more events during the specified time period, the device firmware blocks the

port, disabling transmit and receive traffic until you investigate, solve the problem, and manually

unblock the port.

Physical fabrics, directors, switches, port types, and ports display when you have the privileges to

manage that object and are indicated by the standard product icons.

NOTE

Port Fencing displays any existing thresholds discovered on manageable fabrics, directors, and

switches running firmware versions M-EOS 9.X or Fabric OS 6.2 or later.

Port Fencing requirements

To configure port fencing, the following requirements must be met:

• All Fabric OS devices must have Fabric Watch and must be running firmware Fabric OS 6.2 or

later.

• All M-EOS devices must be running firmware M-EOS 9.X or later.

• All M-EOS devices must be discovered directly using MPI.

Thresholds

You can create thresholds, which you can then assign to available objects in the tree. Port Fencing

threshold types include the following:

• C3 Discard Frames (Fabric OS only)

• Invalid CRCs (Fabric OS only)

• Invalid Words (Fabric OS only)

• Link (M-EOS only)

• Link Reset (Fabric OS only)

• Protocol Errors (M-EOS and Fabric OS)

• Security (M-EOS)

• State Change (Fabric OS only)

NOTE

You can create up to 16 thresholds for M-EOS devices.