The Nexus 7000 platform runs many of the basic Fibre Channel
SAN technologies. To list a few:
Domain Services
VSANs and trunking
Zoning
Aliases
DPVM
Port Security, Fabric Binding and FC-SP
It also supports NPIV.
Note that only Ethernet is supported on the Nexus 7000
including FCoE. No native Fibre Channel
is available on the Nexus 7000.
I’m not going to cover any of these subjects here because I
have already worked with them on the MDS platform.
Nexus 7000 FCoE Notes
FCoE only runs on F series line cards
QoS policy must be the same on all FCoE switches in the
network
Storage VDC
The storage VDC does not support VRF so a default route
should be created w/o a VRF.
Steps to configure the storage VDC
The FCoE feature-set must be installed
N7K-1(config-if)# Install feature-set fcoe
The module(s) that is being used must be licensed
N7K-1(config-if)# license fcoe module 2
The QoS policy must include a no drop policy as well as an
MTU that supports FCoE packets.
N7K-1(config-if)# system qos
The “nexus default-nq-7e-policy” has no drop and a FC MTU
N7K-1(config-if)# service-policy type network-qos policy-map nexus
default-nq-7e-policy
Create the VDC
N7K-1(config-if)# vdc <name> type storage
No L3 interfaces are possible so the default type can be set to L2
N7K-1(config-if)# system default switchport
LLDP is needed for DCBX
N7K-1(config-if)# feature lldp
Next the FCoE VLANs need to be allocated. Don't forget the 'from' or you may not be able to allocate the interfaces.
N7K-1(config-if)# allocate fcoe-vlan range <number> from <default-vdc>
Finally the interfaces need to be allocated
N7K-1(config-if)# allocate interface <number>
Shared Interfaces
Here are some of the caveats regarding shared interfaces from the Cisco FCoE configuration guide:
The following interface config modes are not allowed while sharing an interface from Ethernet vdc to a storage vdc:
• SPAN destination
• Private VLAN mode
• Port-channel interfaces
• Access mode
• mac-packet-classify
• Interfaces that are part of a VLAN that has an associated QoS policy
Shared Ethernet interfaces must be in trunk mode and only shared with one other VDC.
One other important note is that a shared interface can only be in F mode. Shared interfaces are intended to be use to connect to CNA's on hosts not other FC switches.
Here are some of the caveats regarding shared interfaces from the Cisco FCoE configuration guide:
The following interface config modes are not allowed while sharing an interface from Ethernet vdc to a storage vdc:
• SPAN destination
• Private VLAN mode
• Port-channel interfaces
• Access mode
• mac-packet-classify
• Interfaces that are part of a VLAN that has an associated QoS policy
Shared Ethernet interfaces must be in trunk mode and only shared with one other VDC.
One other important note is that a shared interface can only be in F mode. Shared interfaces are intended to be use to connect to CNA's on hosts not other FC switches.
In order to share interfaces between the storage VDC and
another VDC, the switchport must first be made a trunk before the storage VDC
is created. Here are the steps:
Allocate FCoE VLAN range
N7K-1(config-if)# interface <range>
N7K-1(config-if)# switchport mode trunk
N7K-1(config-if)# spanning-tree port type edge trunk
N7K-1(config-if)# vdc <name> type storage
N7K-1(config-if)# allocate shared interface <range>
