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DAILY NEWS AND INFORMATION
FOR THE GLOBAL GRID COMMUNITY / JUNE 16, 2003: VOL. 2 NO. 24
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Applications:
Brocade To Develop API For
Fabric-Based Apps For INCITS T11
Brocade Communications Systems Inc (Brocade), a leading provider of
infrastructure for Storage Area Networks (SANs), announced recently that its
proposal to standardize an Application Programming Interface (API) for
fabric-based applications has been accepted by the International Committee for
Information Technology Standards (INCITS) Technical Committee T11. Task Group
T11.5 will be assigned the project of developing the standard, which will
include a technical evaluation of proposals from Brocade and other storage
networking companies. The standard, to be called the Fabric Application
Interface Standard (FAIS) when released, is anticipated in the middle of 2004.
This initiative is intended to create a standard programming interface for a
new generation of storage applications that run on application processing SAN
switches such as Brocade's SilkWorm Fabric Application Platform (SilkWorm
Fabric AP).
As its contribution to this effort, Brocade will offer Brocade XPath
Technology, its recently announced fabric application API and the basis for
the SilkWorm Fabric AP. XPath Technology was specifically designed to support
applications running in the SAN fabric and integrates storage networking
technology with an optimized mix of general and purpose-optimized processor
technology. The result is a cost-effective platform with the necessary
combination of scalability, performance, and manageability required for
widespread fabric application deployment.
"Brocade's decision to submit its XPath API technology to the T11 standards
body is a positive step for the storage industry since this technology
provides a set of higher order primitives that are hardware agnostic," said
John Webster, Co-Founder and Senior Analyst, Data Mobility Group. "This will
facilitate the migration of applications to the storage network by independent
software vendors and allow customers a wider choice and increased flexibility
in selecting their storage infrastructure."
"Industry standards benefit the customer by encouraging a wider choice of
products, helping drive down the cost, and providing peace of mind that things
will work together," said Mike Klayko, Brocade vice president, Worldwide
Marketing and Support. "As an active participant in and contributor to a wide
array of standards bodies, we are pleased to spearhead the drive to establish
a standard for the emerging area of fabric applications."
As an industry leader, Brocade is an active participant in American
National
Standards Institute (ANSI) INCITS T11, the Distributed Management Task Force
(DMTF), the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA), and the Institute
of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Brocade has authored and/or
co-authored most of the major Fibre Channel standards and helped lead the
Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) definition of Fibre Channel over IP
(FCIP). To help standardize SAN fabric management, Brocade was a major
contributor to the "Bluefin" specification, which is being extended to become
the SNIA Storage Management Initiative Specification v 1.0 (SMI-S). For more
information on Brocade activities in standards, please visit
www.brocade.com/products/fc_standards.jsp.
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