Dell PowerConnect Brocade 300 Fabric OS Administrator's Guide v7.1.0 - Page 336

11 Zone configuration management Zone configuration management You can add, delete, or remove individual elements in an existing zone configuration to create an appropriate configuration for your SAN environment. After the changes have been made, save the configuration to ensure the configuration is permanently saved in the switch and that the configuration is replicated throughout the fabric. The switch configuration file can also be uploaded to the host for archiving and it can be downloaded from the host to a switch in the fabric. See "Configuration file backup" on page 244, "Configuration file restoration" on page 246, or the configUpload and configDownload commands in the Fabric OS Command Reference for additional information on uploading and downloading the configuration file. Security and zoning Zones provide controlled access to fabric segments and establish barriers between operating environments. They isolate systems with different uses, protecting individual systems in a heterogeneous environment; for example, when zoning is in secure mode, no merge operations occur. Brocade Advanced Zoning is configured on the primary fabric configuration server (FCS). The primary FCS switch makes zoning changes and other security-related changes. The primary FCS switch also distributes zoning to all other switches in the secure fabric. All existing interfaces can be used to administer zoning. You must perform zone management operations from the primary FCS switch using a zone management interface, such as Telnet or Web Tools. You can alter a zone database, provided you are connected to the primary FCS switch. When two secure fabrics join, the traditional zone merge does not occur. Instead, a zone database is downloaded from the primary FCS switch of the merged secure fabric. When E_Ports are active between two switches, the name of the FCS server and a zoning policy set version identifier are exchanged between the switches. If the views of the two secure fabrics are the same, the fabric's primary FCS server downloads the zone database and security policy sets to each switch in the fabric. If there is a view conflict, the E_Ports are segmented due to incompatible security data. All zones should use frame-based hardware enforcement; the best way to do this is to use WWN identification exclusively for all zoning configurations. Zone merging When a new switch is added to the fabric, it automatically takes on the zone configuration information from the fabric. You can verify the zone configuration on the switch using the procedure described in "Viewing the configuration in the effective zone database" on page 332. If you are adding a switch that is already configured for zoning, clear the zone configuration on that switch before connecting it to the zoned fabric. See "Clearing all zone configurations" on page 333 for instructions. 336 Fabric OS Administrator's Guide 53-1002745-02