254 Fabric OS Administrator’s Guide
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Zone database size
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Viewing the current default zone access mode
1. Connect to the switch and log in using an account with admin permissions.
2. Enter the defZone
--show command.
If you perform a firmware download of an older release, then the current default zone access state
will appear as it did prior to the download. For example, if the default zoning mode was No Access
before the download, it will remain as No Access afterward.
Zone database size
The maximum size of a zone database is the upper limit for the defined configuration, and it is
determined by the amount of flash memory available for storing the defined configuration.
Use the cfgSize command to display the zone database size.
The supported maximum zone database size is 1 MB.
Virtual Fabric considerations: If Virtual Fabrics is enabled, the sum of the zone database sizes on
all of the logical fabrics must not exceed the maximum size allowed for the chassis (1 MB). The
maximum size limit is enforced per-partition, but is not enforced chassis-wide. If the chassis size
limit is exceeded, you are not informed of this and unpredictable behavior might occur. It is your
responsibility to keep track of the chassis-wide zone database size.
In a fabric with some switches running Fabric OS 7.0.0 or later and some switches running Fabric OS
versions earlier than 7.0.0, if you execute the cfgSave or cfgEnable command from a pre-7.0.0
switch, a zone database size of 128 KB is enforced.
To avoid this problem, use the switch with the highest Fabric OS version to perform zoning tasks, as
described in “Best practices for zoning” on page 244. Alternatively make sure that your pre-7.0.0
switches are upgraded with the latest patch release.
Zone configurations
You can store a number of zones in a zone configuration database. The maximum number of items
that can be stored in the zone configuration database depends on the following criteria:
• Number of switches in the fabric.
• Number of bytes for each item name. The number of bytes required for an item name depends
on the specifics of the fabric, but cannot exceed 64 bytes for each item.
When enabling a new zone configuration, ensure that the size of the defined configuration does not
exceed the maximum configuration size supported by all switches in the fabric. This is particularly
important if you downgrade to a Fabric OS version that supports a smaller zone database than the
current Fabric OS. In this scenario, the zone database in the current Fabric OS would have to be
changed to the smaller zone database before the downgrade.