Administrators Guide (Supporting Fabric OS v7.3.0) Manual

System-defined Admin Domains
AD0 and AD255 are special Admin Domains and are present in every AD-capable fabric.
AD0
AD0 is a system-defined Admin Domain that, in addition to containing members you explicitly added
(similar to user-defined Admin Domains), it contains all online devices, switches, and switch ports that
were not assigned to any user-defined Admin Domain.
Unlike user-defined Admin Domains, AD0 has both an automatic membership list and a fixed
membership list. User-defined Admin Domains have only a fixed membership list.
• Automatic membership list--Contains all devices and switches that were not assigned to any other
Admin Domain.
• Fixed membership list--Contains all devices and switches that you explicitly add to AD0 and can be
used to force device and switch sharing between AD0 and other Admin Domains.
The Admin Domain window displays the fixed members and not the automatic members, you can use
the View menu to display a list of the automatic members.
AD0 can be managed like any user-defined Admin Domain. The only difference between AD0 and
user-defined Admin Domains is the automatic membership list.
In filtered views, the automatic members of AD0 are considered direct members.
The automatic members of AD0 change dynamically as the membership of other Admin Domains
changes. The fixed members of AD0 are not deleted unless you explicitly remove them.
For example, if you explicitly add DeviceA to AD0 and it is not a member of any other Admin Domain,
then DeviceA is both an automatic and a fixed member of AD0. If you add DeviceA to AD2, then
DeviceA is deleted from the AD0 automatic membership list, but is not deleted from the AD0 fixed
membership list. If you then remove DeviceA from AD2, DeviceA is added back to the AD0 automatic
membership list (assuming DeviceA is not in any other Admin Domains).
AD0 is useful if you want to share its zone database (called "root zone database") with a legacy fabric.
AD255 or physical fabric
AD255 is a virtual domain that contains all devices, switches, and switch ports in the fabric. AD255
presents an unfiltered view of the fabric and is also referred to as the physical fabric.
You can use AD255 to do the following:
• Manage other Admin Domains.
• Get an unfiltered view of the fabric.
• Manage ACL and distribution (this can be managed in AD0 if no other Admin Domains are present).
• Manage Advanced Performance Monitoring (this can be managed in AD0 if no other Admin
Domains are present, but only if you are using Web Tools with the EGM license).
The EGM license is required only for 8 Gbps platforms, such as the:
• Brocade Encryption Switch
• Brocade 300, 5300, and 5100 switches
• Brocade VA-40FC
• Brocade 7800
For non-8 Gbps platforms, all functionalities are available without the EGM license.
You cannot manage zones with AD255, because AD255 does not have a zone database associated
with it.
System-defined Admin Domains
86 Web Tools Administrator's Guide
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