FCoE: The Next Generation

The FCoE standard allows host servers on the Ethernet network to access storage on the Fibre Channel SAN. A bridging element known as an FCoE Forwarder forwards frames between the two dissimilar fabric. As currently defined, all FCoE control and data frames must pass through the FCoE Forwarder. The resulting bottleneck problem is unavoidable when the bridging function is required. This is not the case when Fibre Channel devices are gradually phased out and replaced with FCoE ones. This talk will describe the different ways currently being standardized to resolve the bottleneck problem. In addition, this talk will describe an alternative solution which allows customers to retain the use of the FCoE Forwarder for the control plane but bypass it in the data plane.

Learning Objectives

A short introduction to FCoE
FCoE Forwarder (FCF) and its functions
Future FCoE using Control FCF and FDF
Future FCoE without FCF
Future FCoE with FCF