The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 03, 2012
Filed:
Feb. 25, 2003
Claudio Desanti, San Jose, CA (US);
Silvano Gai, San Jose, CA (US);
Fabio R. Maino, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Maurilio Cometto, San Jose, CA (US);
Sachin Jain, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Claudio DeSanti, San Jose, CA (US);
Silvano Gai, San Jose, CA (US);
Fabio R. Maino, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Maurilio Cometto, San Jose, CA (US);
Sachin Jain, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Cisco Technology, Inc., San Jose, CA (US);
Abstract
A reliable asymmetric method for distributing security information within a Fiber Channel Fabric. The Switching Fabric includes a set of security servers, which maintain among themselves a replicated copy of the Fabric security databases using the currently defined Merge and Change protocols. The other Switches of the Fabric are configured as client-Switches. They maintain only the subset of the authorization and authentication information required for their correct operation. A client-Switch queries the security server when a new end-device is connected to it, or when it is connected to the Fabric. When the security configuration of the Fabric changes by an administrative action, a security server solicits the client-Switches to update their information. In an alternative embodiment, the end-devices may query directly the security server, usually for authentication purposes. A Fabric with a plurality of security servers balances among them the load of inquiries from clients, and is more reliable because it continues to operate in the event of failure of one or more servers. Reliability is achieved in a stateless manner through the FSPF protocol, the Fiber Channel routing protocol. Each security server announces itself to the Fabric by advertising an adjacency to a predefined virtual Domain_ID in its FSPF LSRs. Clients access servers by directing queries to this virtual Domain_ID.