Method and System of Centralized Control and Management for Fiber Channel Over Ethernet Networks

A fiber channel over Ethernet (FCoE) network, comprising:

• an FCoE controller and manager (FCM);
• a first FCoE data forwarder (FDF) coupled to the FCM;
• and
• a second FDF coupled to the first FDF such that the first FDF is positioned between the FCM and the second FDF,
• wherein the FCM sends to the first FDF a first FDF Forwarding Table (FFT) request that comprises a base forwarding table,
• wherein the first FDF sends to the FCM a first FDF acceptance indicating that the base forwarding table was correctly received, and
• wherein the FDF updates the first forwarding table using port information and media access control (MAC) address obtained from FCoE data frames comprising fiber channel (FC) data.

A method implemented in a first fiber channel over Ethernet (FCoE) data forwarder (FDF) coupled to an FCoE controller and manager (FCM), the method comprising:

• receiving from the FCM a first N_Port identifier range allocation (NRA) request comprises a base forwarding table;
• sending to the FCM a first NRA acceptance indicating that the base forwarding table was received;
• receiving a FCoE data frame comprising a media access control (MAC) address, a port identifier, and fiber channel (FC) data;
• and
• updating the base forwarding table using the MAC address and the port identifier.