Brocade FICON Administrator’s Guide (Supporting Fabric OS v7.3.0) - Manual (Page 17)

Switched point-to-point
A single-switch configuration is called switched point-to-point allows the channel to use single-byte
addressing.
FIGURE 2 Switched point-to-point FICON
Cascaded FICON
Cascaded FICON refers to an implementation of FICON that uses one or more FICON channel paths in
which the domain ID of the entry switch is different than the domain ID of the switch where the control
unit is attached. Therefore, cascading requires a two-byte link address. Anytime a two-byte link address
is defined on a channel, all link addresses must be two-byte link addresses.
Switches may be interconnected using the following links:
• Traditional Inter-Switch Links (ISLs)
• Inter-Chassis Links (ICLs)
• Fibre Channel over Internet Protocol (FCIP)
The processor interface is connected to one switch (known as the entry switch), while the storage
interface is connected to the other. This configuration is supported for both disk and tape, with multiple
processors, disk subsystems, and tape subsystems sharing the ISLs or ICLs between the switches and
backbones. Multiple ISLs between the switches and backbones are also supported. Cascading between
Switched point-to-point
FICON Administrator's Guide 15
53-1003144-01