Cisco Technology, Inc.

Pradeep Kanyar

Sandeep Dhar

Methods and apparatus for automatically configuring an aggregated link between a device supporting Fiber Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) and two or more FCoE Forwarders (FCFs) configured as a virtual switch in an effort to isolate FCoE traffic from FCoE Initialization Protocol (FIP) traffic in the aggregated link without user intervention. The virtual switch may be configured using virtual PortChannel (vPC) or MultiChassis EtherChannel (MCEC) technology, for example. For some embodiments, following an exchange of Data Center Bridge Exchange (DCBX) Protocol packets identifying the aggregated link relationship to the device (e.g., a host or intermediate bridge), subchannels may be automatically created within the aggregated link and designated as carrying either FCoE or FIP traffic, thereby isolating the subchannels. In this manner, a user need not perform manual isolation of FCoE-carrying trunks in a data center environment.

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Bengaluru, India

Pradeep Kanyar