Fabric Manager Users Guide, Version 6.1, Revision A - QLogic

1–Overview of the QLogic Fabric Manager Suite
Component Overview
Figure 1-1. QLogic Fabric Manager Subnet Manager
When there is more than one SM on a given fabric, arbitration takes place
between them to assign one as master and the rest as standby SMs. Refer to
“Fabric Manager Role Arbitration” on page 1-6 for SM arbitration rules.
SMs communicate with each other over InfiniBand. If the standby SM’s detect that
the master SM can not be found (For example, the node on which it is running has
lost communication with the fabric, or it has been shut down), then the standby
SMs re-enter arbitration to choose a new master SM.
When running SM on a switch and on a host simultaneously requires that the
ConfigConsistencyCheckMethod be set to 1 instead of the default 0 as described
in Table 3-2. If the ConfigConsistencyCheckMethod method is left as default 0
then the standby SM will become Inactive.
Subnet Administration
The Subnet Administration function acts in tight coordination with the SM to
perform data storage and retrieval of fabric information. The SM/SA is a single
unified entity.
Through the use of SA messages, nodes on the fabric can gain access to fabric
information such as:
• Node-to-node path information
• Fabric Topology and configuration
• Event notification
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