Dell Networking 7048 User's Configuration Guide - Page 761

26 Configuring Connectivity Fault Management This chapter describes how to configure the Connectivity Fault Management feature, which is specified in IEEE 802.1ag (IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Virtual Bridged Local Area Networks Amendment 5: Connectivity Fault Management). This protocol, also known as Dot1ag, enables the detection and isolation of connectivity faults at the service level for traffic that is bridged over a metropolitan Ethernet LAN. The topics covered in this chapter include: • Dot1ag Overview • Default Dot1ag Values • Configuring Dot1ag (Web) • Configuring Dot1ag (CLI) • Dot1ag Configuration Example Dot1ag Overview With the emergence of Ethernet as a Metropolitan and Wide-Area Networking technology, different operators often work together to provide end-to-end services to enterprise customers. This has driven the need of a new set of OAM (Operations, Administration, and Maintenance) Protocols. Service-Level Connectivity Fault Management (CFM) is the OAM protocol provision for end-to-end service-layer instances in carrier networks. CFM provides mechanisms to support the administrator in performing connectivity checks, fault detection, fault verification and isolation, and fault notification per service in the network domain of interest. Unlike Ethernet OAM (IEEE 802.3ah), where the faults are detected and notified on a single point-to-point IEEE Std. 802.3 LAN, Dot1ag addresses fault diagnosis at the service layer across networks comprising multiple LANs, including LANs other than 802.3 media. Configuring Connectivity Fault Management 761