Systems and methods for dynamically assigning membership in a data partition to an end-port of a requesting host channel adapter. An exemplary embodiment can provide a subnet manager configured to operate within a subnet of a network fabric. The subnet can include a plurality of nodes, and the plurality of nodes can include at least one switch and a plurality of end-nodes, where the subnet manager executes on one of the plurality of nodes. A host channel adapter of a node in the subnet can request membership for an end-port of the host channel adapter. In response to the request, the subnet manager can request data from the data store to confirm that the end-port is a member of an admin partition and that the admin partition is associated with the data partition in which membership was requested.

System and method for correlating fabric-level group membership with subnet-level partition membership in a high performance computing environment. An exemplary embodiment can provide an admin partition in a subnet of a network environment, associated with a resource domain at the fabric level of the network environment. The admin partition can be defined by a P_Key that is stored in a fabric-level database. Each fabric resource is identified by an identifier that is stored in the fabric-level database. When fabric resources are added as members to the resource domain, a relationship is created between the P_Key and the identifier of the fabric resource, where the relationship defines the resource as a member of the admin partition. Access rights can be granted based on the relationship.

Systems and methods for dynamically assigning membership in a data partition to an end-port of a requesting host channel adapter. An exemplary embodiment can provide a subnet manager configured to operate within a subnet of a network fabric. The subnet can include a plurality of nodes, and the plurality of nodes can include at least one switch and a plurality of end-nodes, where the subnet manager executes on one of the plurality of nodes. A host channel adapter of a node in the subnet can request membership for an end-port of the host channel adapter. In response to the request, the subnet manager can request data from the data store to confirm that the end-port is a member of an admin partition and that the admin partition is associated with the data partition in which membership was requested.

Embodiments for server port virtualization for guest logical unit number (LUN) masking in a host direct attach configuration using a storage adapter in a computing environment by a processor. An F switch port is simulated by an N storage port to enable either N-port virtualization (NPV) or N-port identification (ID) virtualization (NPIV) in the host direct attach configuration by directly attaching the N server port to the N storage port. A domain name system (DNS) operation is performed to cause each virtualized N-port ID to be mapped to fiber channel (FC) IDs in domain format of domain, area, port.

A Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) network can be inexpensively extended by additional switches (220x) that do not have a full FCoE functionality, e.g. do not have full E-port functionality. The additional switches may or may not have unique Domain IDs. A virtual switch fabric can be extended by such additional switches.

Aspects of the invention include receiving a request from an initiator channel on an initiator node to initiate a secure communication with a responder channel on a responder node. The receiving is at a local key manager (LKM) executing on the initiator node. A security association is created at the LKM between the initiator node and the responder node. An identifier of a shared key assigned for communication between the initiator node and the responder node is obtained, and a message requesting initialization of the secure communication between the initiator channel and the responder channel is built. The message includes the identifier of the shared key. The message is sent to the initiator channel.

Presented are efficient systems and methods for automatically detecting and configuring network connections in Fibre Channel (FC) and similar networks. In various embodiments, this is accomplished by using an I/O module (IOM)'s fabric login (FLOGI) response or FLOGI request to identify the type of an uplink interface as either FC Gateway or FC Direct Attach, determining whether server interfaces coupled to the IOM support FCoE, and then, automatically configuring server interfaces based on the identified type of uplink interface.

A zone merging system includes a first FC networking device that is associated with one or more first FC networking device zones and a second FC networking device that is associated with one or more second FC networking device zones, wherein each of the one or more first and second FC networking device zones identifies a plurality of zone member devices. The second FC networking device performs limited zone merging operations subsequent to establishing a link with the first FC networking device. The limited zone merging operations include merging, via the link with first FC networking device zones, each of the second FC networking device zones that identifies at least one zone member device that is not local to the second FC networking device, while not merging each of the second FC networking device zones that identify only zone members that are local to the second FC networking device.

A Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) network can be inexpensively extended by additional switches (220x) that do not have a full FCoE functionality, e.g. do not have full E-port functionality. The additional switches may or may not have unique Domain IDs. A virtual switch fabric can be extended by such additional switches.

A storage system in one embodiment comprises at least one storage array comprising a plurality of storage devices. The storage array is configured to communicate over one or more networks with a plurality of host devices. The storage array is further configured to receive one or more commands from a given one of the host devices directing that a particular user-defined name be assigned to a particular one of the storage devices, and responsive to receipt of the one or more commands, to determine if any other user-defined name is already assigned to the particular storage device, and if there is no other user-defined name already assigned to the particular storage device, to assign the particular user-defined name to the particular storage device and to store information characterizing the assignment of the particular user-defined name to the particular storage device in persistent memory of the storage array.