as shown in fig1 , an fcoe vn_port virtualizer ( fvv : fcoe vn_port virtualizer ) 102 connects to an fcf 104 which is connected to an fc fabric or storage area network ( san ) 106 . the fvv 102 runs a limited lightweight stack of fcoe services without using a domain , dedicated or shared , from the san . an fvv 102 provides npiv services for fcoe devices and does not directly connect to an fc san 106 . an fvv 102 works as an n_port virtualizer ( npiv ) between enode devices 108 attached to it and the fcf 104 or further fvvs 102 to which it connects . the port types supported on the fvv 102 are vf_ports 110 and vn_ports 112 . the vf_ports 110 are created logically on top of physical cee interfaces and provide fcoe initialization protocol ( fip ) vlan discovery and fip discovery services to the attached devices . the enode devices 108 do not directly log into the fvv 102 , rather the fvv 102 converts any f port logins ( flogis ) to fdiscs ( discover f port parameters ) and forwards all fdiscs to the connected fcf 104 . the vn_port 112 of the fvv 102 performs its own fip discovery and flogi operations with the fcf 104 to establish the base vn_port . vf_ports 110 on the fvv support npiv capability in their own right , which provides potential for two levels of npiv , one to the vf_port 110 and one from the vf_port 116 on the fcf 104 . user defined mappings associate vf_ports 110 with vn_ports 112 on the fvv 102 . since vn_ports 112 have a 1 : 1 physical connection to either a vf_port 116 on an fcf 104 or on another fvv 102 , this vf — vn association on the fvv 102 determines which fabric switch f_port an enode device 108 logs into . a vn_port 112 on the fvv 102 logs into the fcf 104 or fvv 102 vf_port 110 as a base npiv device and gets assigned an fc - id . the enode devices 108 on the fvv 102 which login through this vn_port 112 are also treated as subsequent npiv logins on the fcf 104 or fvv 102 vf_port 110 . thus , the enode devices 108 obtain their fc - ids from the fcf 104 . device flogis received on vf_ports 110 are trapped and sent to an fcf 104 as fdiscs . thus , each fcf 104 vf_port 116 receives an flogi sent by the fvv 102 vn_port 112 and then subsequent fdiscs sent on behalf of the enode devices 108 or potentially other fvvs 102 . the fip and flogi exchange over an fvv 102 is outlined in fig2 . fig2 shows an fvv 102 with a converged enhanced ethernet ( cee ) chip 118 with 24 cee interfaces 120 configured as vf_ports 110 and 8 cee interfaces 122 configured as vn_ports 112 . the vf_ports 110 and vn_ports 112 are created on top of cee interfaces . thus there are 24 vf_ports 110 and 8 vn_ports 112 on the fvv 102 shown in fig2 . interconnect 136 is a switching fabric that allows packet transfer between the various cee interfaces 120 , 122 as appropriate . cp 124 is the core or control processor on the fvv 102 . packets may be forwarded to the cp 124 from the cee interfaces and the cp 124 can provide packets to the cee interfaces 120 , 122 using either the interconnect 136 or through sideband connections , neither of which are shown for simplicity . a virtualizer daemon ( vd ) 126 is a user space or similar software module which implements and controls the fvv mode and runs on the cp 124 . routing table storage 138 is provided for use by the cee chip 118 and the cp 124 . the tables in the routing table storage 138 are discussed in more detail below . as shown in fig2 , fip vlan and fcf discovery and responses are trapped by the vf_ports 110 and forwarded for handling by the vd 126 simulating an fcf 104 as indicated by dashed lines 128 . in the next phase the device fip flogis / fdiscs are trapped on the vf_ports 110 and sent to the vd 136 as shown by dashed lines 130 . the vd 126 converts flogis to fdiscs , as an initial flogi will have occurred on fvv 102 startup , and sends the fdiscs to the fcf 104 over the appropriate mapped vn_ports 112 as shown by the dashed lines 132 . this involves creating a new fcoe packet for the fip fdisc and copying over the device fip flogi into it . thus , the vd 126 on the fvv 102 maintains device login database and performs login translation . the fip fdisc responses from the fcf 104 are trapped on the ingress vn_ports 112 by the vd 126 . these may need to be converted to fip flogi responses , as necessary . these are copied into new fcoe packets and sent to the enode devices 108 . a fip fdisc response from the fcf 104 contains the fc - id for the device 108 , thus the device 108 now has a pid assigned . for example , an fvv 102 vn_port 112 performs fip flogi to the fcf 104 and receives a base fc - id of 0x010100 . all subsequent device logins through this vn_port 112 receive fc - ids as 0x010101 , 0x010102 etc . this fip fdisc response from the fcf 104 is the trigger for setting up routes for the data path on the fvv 102 . flogi and subsequent data frames from the device 108 use the data path 134 ( shown via dash and dot lines in fig2 ). once an enode device 108 has logged into the fc fabric , the fvv 102 simply works as a pass - through module for data frames . the data path 134 utilizes virtual fabric routing ( vfr ) within the switch . data frames are moved between the cee interfaces with fcoe header editing performed in the process . the fvv 102 runs a significantly reduced set of fc fabric services and these are managed by the vd 126 . for example , fc name server and fc management server do not run on fvv 102 . the vd 126 on the fvv 102 communicates with fabric services on an fcf 104 using fc - gs exchanges such as gmal , gfn , rpab , etc . the fvv 102 provides graceful failover / failback for devices if the fcoe vn_port 112 links go down . fig3 a and 4 - 8 illustrate ethernet fabric operations according to the present invention . the preferred embodiment uses the vcs architecture from brocade communications systems , inc . more details on the vcs architecture are provided in u . s . patent application publication nos . 2011 / 0299391 , 2011 / 0286357 , 2011 / 0268125 , 2011 / 0299535 , 2011 / 0268120 , and 2011 / 0292947 , which are hereby incorporated by reference . support for npiv - based vn_port to vf_port bridging between fcoe devices 306 attached to the ethernet fabric 302 and the fcfs 308 , the preferred embodiment permits the ethernet fabric 302 to be viewed as a single fcoe vn_port virtualizer ( fvv ). in addition , from the fcoe device point of view , the fabric appears as a single logical fvv . all ethernet fabric switches , also known as rbridges or rbs , 304 use the same external fvv mac address . the ethernet fabric 302 handles the fip protocol processing and the fcoe encapsulation between the ethernet fabric 302 and the fcfs 308 , but all san fabric services are provided by the fc san fabric 310 . traffic between fcoe vn_ports 317 on enode devices 306 and fcf 308 vf_ports 320 is bridged by an fvv switch functionality 314 embedded in an rbridge or ethernet fabric switch 306 connected directly to the fcf 308 via an fcoe vn_port 316 to fcoe vf_port 320 link . however , traffic between fcoe vn_ports 317 and fcoe vn_ports 318 is not forwarded to the fc fabric for routing , it is trill forwarded directly from the ingress ethernet fabric switch 304 to the egress ethernet fabric switch 304 as shown in fig3 . the rbs or ethernet fabric switches are interconnected using ethernet fabric ports . for the sake of clarity , we need to distinguish between the two types of ethernet fabric switches that may exist in this model . an ethernet fabric switch ( rb for rbridge ) that includes fvv functionality and is directly connected to an fcf is called a v - rb switch , for virtualizer - rbridge , in this document ( v - rb 1 304 in fig3 ) as they contain embedded fvv functionality . ethernet fabric switches 304 ( rb for rbridge ) provide the following services : fip discovery and vlan services for fcoe devices attached to this switch ; via ethernet name server ( ens ) distribution services , which is used to maintain coherency of information among the various rbs as discussed in publication no . 2011 / 0299535 incorporated above , notify all other rbs of link establishment , status , etc . and fcoe vn_port additions and deletions . at a high level , the forwarding logic for a received fcoe frame is : in order to facilitate the direct forwarding of fcoe to fcoe traffic from ingress rb to egress rb in the ethernet fabric , each rb in the ethernet fabric has knowledge of every fcoe vn_port attached to fabric , similar to the ethernet fabric model for l2 ethernet mac addresses as discussed in related application ser . no . 14 / 206 , 879 incorporated above . when an fcoe enode device successfully logs in to the fc san , the egress rb traps the fip login response and updates all rbs of the new device &# 39 ; s fpma mac using the ens distribution service . this ens update includes a flag indicating that this is an fcoe vn_port mac , and rather than installing an entry in the l2 tables , each rb installs a 24 bit fcoe da entry using the low order three bytes of the vn_port fpma mac address as these correspond to the fc pid of the vn_port . this allows any fcoe frame ingressing on any rb in the fabric , destined to the vn_port , to be directly forwarded to the egress rb , the rb to which the vn_port is attached . note that this entry is based on the egress rb and not the ingress rb . from the perspective pf the fc fabric , the vn_port on the ingress rb will have all of the fcids which are provided to the various enode vn_ports as it is performing npiv operations and passing the same fcid through . if the ingress rb provided this information for inclusion in the routing tables then all of the fcids would ; actually be duplicated , once at the ingress rb and once at the egress rb , which might cause routing problems . as any fc device which is being addressed by the enode will not have any entries in the 24 bit portion of the routing table and the ingress vn_ports will not have entries in the 24 bit portion of the routing table , any frames directed to other enode vn_ports on the ethernet fabric will be able to unambiguously determine their route from the 24 bit table entries . upon establishment of an vn_port to vf_port link from an rb in the ethernet fabric to the fcf , the rb notifies all rbs in the ethernet fabric of the link establishment via the ens distribution service . the link is identified by the fc domain and area assigned by the fc fabric to the rb vn_port in response to the rb flogi . each rb installs an fcoe acl entry to facilitate a 16 bit fc sid domain , area based lookup with the result being forward to the rb owning the vn_port to fcf vf_port link , or to the egress interface if this is the owning rb . it is noted that the lookup to determine if the packet is destined to a vn_port or enode connected to the ethernet fabric has precedence over these lookups which route the packet to the rb . as any fc device which is being addressed by the enode will not have any entries in the 24 bit portion of the routing table and the ingress vn_ports will not have entries in the 24 bit portion of the routing table , any frames not directed to other enode vn_ports on the ethernet fabric will be able to determine their route from the 16 bit table entries as there are no 24 bit entries . with these two sets of entries , lower 24 bits of fcoe da for each connected enode and 16 bit domain , area for each fcf - connected vn_port , added to the normal ethernet fabric routing tables , in the ethernet name server and other tables in the switch as described in publication no . 2011 / 0299535 incorporated above , all fcoe packets from enodes or fc packets from the fc fabric can be properly routed to the correct egress port of the ethernet fabric . fig3 a illustrates a redundant path version of the network of fig3 . v - rb 1 and v - rb 4 304 provide redundant access to the fc san a 310 through the parallel connections to fcfs fc domains 10 and 12 308 . v - rb 1 304 is a primary vn_port virtualizer and v - rb 4 304 is a non - primary vn_port virtualizer . device login is done using the primary , v - rb 1 304 in the example . when the primary fails , the non - primary takes over operation and provides a redundant path to the fc san a 310 . in certain embodiments the failover may be seamless , as the non - primary may perform address translation . in other embodiments the failover can be accomplished using conventional failover mechanisms utilizing different addresses . rerouting inside the ethernet fabric 302 is handled using conventional trill failover techniques . fig4 is an alternate embodiment having a more conventional ethernet network instead of an ethernet fabric . as such , individual switches 404 which each include fvv functionality 414 are interconnected to form the network 402 . as such , each switch 404 performs the operations described above independently , not as a distributed unit as done in the ethernet fabric 302 with the rbs 304 . however , preferably a service equivalent to the ens service is utilized to allow direct enode to enode routing as discussed above . the illustrated embodiment switch 1 404 performs the initial login to the fcf domain 10 408 and receives the base fc address for the network 402 . switch 2 404 and switch 3 404 each perform their own base login through switch 1 404 , which converts the fip flogis to fip fdiscs . thus the base addresses for switches 2 and 3 404 are addresses based on the switch 1 404 base address . as each enode device 406 performs its own fip flogi , the switches 2 and 3 404 convert them to a fip fdisc and sends them to switch 1 404 , which passes them through to the fcf fc domain 10 408 . fcf fc domain 10 408 then provides another fcid , which trickles back down to the requesting enode device 406 . it is noted in this configuration that consecutive fcids may not go to enode devices 406 on the same switch , such as switch 2 404 or switch 3 404 , as the fcf fc domain 10 408 will provide addresses to switch 1 404 unaware of the underlying topology of the network 402 . as the switches 404 preferably have full tables as discussed above with regard to the rbs , this is not a problem . it is understood that each switch in this case may not be able to receive a full complement of fcids as the total fcids provided through a single vn_port 422 of switch 1 404 is distributed among the three switches illustrated . fig5 and 6 illustrate data flow for two cases , respectively fcoe host to fc target and fc target to fcoe host . fig7 illustrates the fip vlan and fip fcf discovery operations for both an rb connected to an fcf and for enode devices connected to an rb . fig8 illustrates the fip flogi or fdisc operations . referring to fig5 , an exemplary network architecture is illustrated . an ethernet fabric 552 is connected to an fc san 554 . the ethernet fabric 552 includes various interconnected switches . switch v - rb 1 556 is connected to switch v - rb 2 558 . switch v - rb 1 556 and switch v - rb 2 558 include fvv functionality as indicated by the v - designation . switch v - rb 1 556 and switch v - rb 2 558 also act as rbridges in the ethernet fabric as indicated by the rb designation . switches rb 3 560 , rb 4 562 and rb 5 564 are each connected to each of switches v - rb 1 556 and v - rb 2 558 to form the ethernet fabric 552 . the fc san 554 is formed by fcfs 566 and 568 and fc switches 570 and 572 , each switch including exemplary domain values . fcfs 566 and 568 are shown as each having two ports for connection to the ethernet fabric 552 , with port 1 being connected to switch v - rb 1 556 and port 2 being connected to switch v - rb 2 558 . an fcoe host h 1 574 is shown connected to switch rb 3 560 , while fc target t 1 576 is shown as connected to switch 570 , which has domain 12 . this basic illustrated architecture is used in variations in fig5 - 8 to illustrate packet flow in various situations . in fig5 data flow from fcoe host h 1 574 to fc target t 1 576 is illustrated . assume fcoe host h 1 574 is logged into fcf domain 11 568 , port ( area ) 2 . also assume there is a single external fcf mac for the ethernet fabric 552 which is programmed as a “ ext fcf mac ” on all rbridges in the ethernet fabric 552 . use of “ ext fcf mac ” is proper as each enode believe that it is connected to an fcf . further assume that the ethernet fabric switches 556 - 564 each use an individual , internal fvv mac value for ingress rbridge to egress rbridge / ag fcoe traffic . fcoe host h 1 574 provides an fcoe packet to switch rb 3 560 as illustrated by the arrow a 502 . the fcoe packet has the following values : da : ext fcf mac , sa : h 1 vn fpma mac , vid : fcoe vlan , did : t 1 fcid and sid : h 1 fcid . switch rb 3 560 performs the following processing on the packet : 1 . promote to l3 ( because da = ext fcf mac ). the promotion to l3 results in using different fields for routing , in this case either the did or sid fields in the embedded packet . 2 . 24 bit did lookup = miss ( because the destination is not an fcoe device connected to the ethernet fabric 552 ) 3 . 16 bit sid lookup = hit ( because it is a known fc device ), result = forward to switch v - rb 2 558 ( because of routing table entry ) 4 . trill forward to switch v - rb 2 558 ( normal ethernet fabric operation ) the ethernet fabric packet is forwarded from switch rb 3 560 to switch v - rb 2 558 as illustrated by arrow b 504 . the packet has the following values : trill da = v - rb 2 , trill sa = rb 3 , inner da = v - rb 2 int fvv mac , inner sa = rb 3 int fvv mac , vid = fcoe vlan , did = t 1 fcid and sid = h 1 fcid . switch v - rb 2 458 performs the following processing on the packet : 3 . 24 bit did lookup = miss ( because the destination is not an fcoe device connected to the ethernet fabric 452 ) 4 16 bit sid lookup = hit ( because it is a known fc domain and area ), result = forward to v - rb 2 558 fcf ( egid ) ( because of routing table entry ) the fcoe packet is provided from switch v - rb 2 558 to port 2 of fcf 568 as illustrated by arrow c 506 . the fcoe packet has the following values : da : fcf 11 mac , sa : v - rb 2 vn fpma mac , vid : fcoe vlan , did = t 1 fcid and sid = h 1 fcid . flow inside the fc san 554 is as normal and is not illustrated . table 1 provides the above operations and flow in table format . referring to fig6 , data flow from fc target t 1 576 to fcoe host h 1 574 is illustrated . again assume fcoe host h 1 574 is logged into fc domain 11 , port ( area ) 2 . normal fc forwarding occurs on the fc packet from fc target t 1 576 to fcf 568 , domain 11 , port 2 . because fcf 568 assumes the fcoe host h 1 is connected through port 2 , the fcoe packet flows from fcf 568 to switch v - rb 2 558 as shown by arrow a 602 . the fcoe packet has the following values : da : v - rb 2 vn fpma mac , sa : fcf 11 mac , vid : fcoe vlan , did = h 1 fcid and sid = t 1 fcid . switch v - rb 2 558 performs the following processing on the packet : 3 . 24 bit did lookup = hit ( because the destination is an fcoe device connected to the ethernet fabric 552 ), result = forward to rb 3 560 ( because of the routing table entry ) the ethernet fabric packet is provided from switch v - rb 2 558 to switch rb 3 560 as illustrated by arrow b 604 . the ethernet fabric packet has the following values : trill da = rb 3 , trill sa = v - rb 2 , inner da = rb 3 int fvv mac , inner sa = v - rb 2 int fvv mac , vid = fcoe vlan , did = h 1 fcid and sid = t 1 fcid . 2 . promote to l3 ( because da = rb 3 int fvv mac ) 3 . 24 bit sid lookup = hit ( because the destination is an fcoe device connected to the ethernet fabric 452 ), result = forward to h 1 ( egid ) ( because of the routing table entry ) the fcoe packet is provided from switch rb 3 560 to fcoe host h 1 574 illustrated by arrow c 606 . the fcoe packet has the following values : da : h 1 vn fpma mac , sa : ext fcf mac , vid : fcoe vlan , did : h 1 fcid and sid : t 1 fcid . table 2 provides the above operations and flow in table format . addressing the switch v - rb 2 558 first , first fip vlan discovery occurs , then fip discovery . switch v - rb 2 558 transmits a fip vlan request to the fcf domain 11 568 as shown by arrow a 702 . the fip vlan request packet has the following values : da : all_fcfs_mac , sa : v - rb 2 enode mac and vid : any valid vlan . the fcf 568 performs normal fcf processing and returns a response as shown by arrow b 704 . the fip vlan notification packet has the following values : da : v - rb 2 enode mac , sa : fcf 11 mac and vid : same as request . the switch v - rb 2 558 next performs fip discovery . the fip discovery solicitation packet flows to fcf 568 as shown by arrow a 702 . the fip discovery solicitation packet has the following values : da : all_fcfs_mac , sa : v - rb 2 enode mac and vid : fcoe vlan . again the fcf 568 performs normal processing and returns a fip solicited advertisement packet as shown by arrow b 704 . the fip solicited advertisement packet has the following values : da : v - rb 2 enode mac , sa : fcf 11 fcf mac and vid : fcoe vlan . proceeding to the host h 1 574 , the fip request is provided from fcoe host h 1 574 to switch rb 3 560 as shown by arrow c 706 . the fip request packet has the following values : da : all_fcfs_mac , sa : h 1 enode mac and vid : any valid vlan . 2 . cp generates fip vlan notification ( because it is acting as the fcf entity ) the fip notification flows from switch rb 3 560 to fcoe host h 1 574 as shown by arrow d 708 . the fip notification packet has the following values : da : h 1 enode mac , sa : ext fcf mac and vid : same as request . for fip discovery , the fip solicitation packet flows from fcoe host h 1 574 to switch rb 3 560 as shown by arrow c 706 . the fip discovery packet has the following values : da : all_fcfs_mac , sa : h 1 enode mac and vid : fcoe vlan . 2 . cp generates fip solicited advertisement ( because it is acting as the fcf entity ) the fip solicited advertisement packet flows from switch rb 3 560 to fcoe host h 1 574 as shown by arrow d 708 . the fip solicited advertisement packet has the following values : da : h 1 enode mac , sa : ext fcf mac and vid : fcoe vlan . tables 3 and 4 provide the above operations and flow in table format . fig8 , illustrates the fip flogi or fdisc operations . the fip virtual link instantiation ( vli ) login ( flogi or fdisc ) operations are as follows . assume that fcoe host h 1 574 is logging into fc domain 11 , port 2 on fcf 568 . the fip vli request packet flows from fcoe host h 1 574 to switch rb 3 560 as shown by arrow a 802 . the fip vli request packet has the following values : da : ext fcf mac , sa : h 1 enode mac , vid : fcoe vlan , did : fffffe and sid : 000000 . 1 . trap to cp ( because it is a fip packet as determined by an fip ethernet type trap ) 2 . use login management as described below to determine egress v - rb for the packet the trill packet flows from switch rb 3 560 to switch v - rb 2 558 as shown by arrow b 804 . the trill packet has the following values : trill da = v - rb 2 , trill sa = rb 3 , inner da = v - rb 2 int fvv mac , inner sa = h 1 enode mac , vid = fcoe vlan , did : fffffe and sid : 000000 . as switch g - rb 2 558 is acting as the fvv functionality , it performs the following login processing : 1 . normal fcoe gateway flogi / fdisc processing ( with the switch v - rb 2 558 presenting as an fcoe vn_port , most preferably a port that has npiv or virtual n_port capabilities ). in this case the switch v - rb 2 558 converts the fip flogi to a fip fdisc . thus the fip fdisc flows from the switch v - rb 2 458 to fcf 468 ( fc domain 11 ) as shown by arrow c 806 . fcf 568 responds to the fip fdisc from switch v - rb 2 558 by returning either a fip vli ls - acc ( successful login ) or ls - rjt as shown by arrow d 808 . switch v - rb 2 558 simply passes the fip fdisc response directly through , just performing trill operations . in this case the switch v - rb 2 558 provides the fip response packet to switch rb 3 560 as shown by arrow e 810 . the trill packet has the following values : trill da = rb 3 , trill sa = v - rb 2 , inner da = h 1 enode mac , inner sa = rb 2 int fvv mac , vid = fcoe vlan , did = h 1 fcid , sid = fffffe 1 . trap to cp ( because it is a fip packet as determined by an fip ethernet type trap ) 3a : if link service accept ( ls_acc ), send ens update to all rbs if the response is an ls_acc , then switch rb 3 560 provides an ens notification to all rbs as shown by arrows f 812 . 3a . 2 . new fcoe vn_port processing . each rb adds an fcoe exm entry using low order 3 bytes of vn_port mac address as fcid to indicate presence of enode on the ethernet fabric 552 . the fip vli response flows from switch rb 3 560 to enode host h 1 574 as shown by arrow g 814 . this fcoe fip packet has the following values : da : h 1 enode mac , sa : ext fcf mac , vid : fcoe vlan , did = h 1 fcid , sid = fffffe . table 5 provides the above operations and flow in table format . in a deployment where the fcf - connected rb is not at the first ethernet fabric hop , the first hop rb must decide to which fcf - connected rb it should forward fcoe enode device fip flogis . in one embodiment an automatic method is used . in a second embodiment , a configurable fcoe login management model is used . the automatic embodiment utilizes the ens distribution services to provide updates from rbs to all other rbs with current ethernet fabric - fcf link usage information . if the fcf - connected rb is the first hop , then if a single logical fcoe vn_port to vf_port link is established on the fcf - connected rb , forward fip flogi on it . if multiple logical fcoe vn_port to vf_port links are established on this fcf - connected rb , forward an ethernet fabric fip flogi on the link with the least number of fcoe device logins per link bandwidth . if a fcf - connected rb is not the first hop , then send the flogi to the fcf - connected rb with the least number of ethernet fabric - fcf logins per total uplink bandwidth . note that fdisc based login from the same enode must be sent to the same fcf - connected rb and forwarded on the same vn_port to vf_port link , so the enode to fcf - connected rb association must be retained in the first hop non - fcf - connected rb . the second embodiment provides the san administrator with a facility to map enode devices to a specific ethernet fabric - fcf link , and therefore to a specific fc san domain , area . the resulting login management database is distributed to all rbs in the ethernet fabric . fig9 illustrates that the v - rb 1 314 need not be directly connected to the fcf 308 but rather there can be an intervening ethernet fabric 302 ′ between the vn_port 318 and the vf_port 320 of the fcf 308 . therefore the vn_port 318 is connected to vf_port 316 ′ and the v - rb 1 304 ′ is connected to the vf_port 320 . this shows that the vn_port 318 from the v - rb 1 need not be connected to an fcf but can be connected to any device , in this case rb 2 304 ′, that presents a vf_port . ethernet fabric 302 , specifically v - rb 1 304 , handles virtualization and npiv operations for enodes 306 , with ethernet fabric 302 ′ performing virtualization and npiv operations for its connected devices , in this case ethernet fabric 302 . fcf 308 performs the normal functions for the enodes 306 , just virtualized a second level by ethernet fabric 302 ′ as packets such as fip vli traverse the two ethernet fabrics 302 and 302 ′. fig1 illustrates a first alternate embodiment . each rb 1004 in an ethernet fabric 1002 includes an fcf daemon 1014 ( fcfd ) and so is referred to as an f - rb . the fcf daemon 1014 provides all fc services normally provided by an fcf , which is sufficient to operate an fc fabric . in this embodiment each rb 1004 handles the login operations of its connected enodes 1006 as it contains full fc services . ens can be used as above to maintain the tables used for direct routing or similar fc inter - switch communications can be used , as those will be provided to allow the fcf daemons 1014 to operate as a normal fc fabric . the vf port 1040 of the f - rb 2 1014 is connected to the vn_port 318 of v - rb 1 304 to act as the fcf instead of an actual fcf such as fcf 308 . this is another example of the vn_port 318 being connected to a vf_port from a device other than an fcf , in this case f - rb 2 1004 . thus the f - rb 2 1004 handles the login of enodes connected to the ethernet fabric 302 as the ethernet fabric 302 is operating as a virtual vn_port virtualizer . fig1 is a second alternate embodiment . instead of being an ethernet fabric , the network 1102 is a lossless ethernet network , as appropriate for fcoe operation . in the illustrated embodiment instead of rbs as used in the ethernet fabric , ethernet switches 1104 are used , with the switches also complying with the requirements for an fcf . the switches / fcfs are connected using ve_ports 1142 but still present vf_ports to the enode 1106 and the vn_port 318 of the ethernet fabric 302 which is acting as the virtualizer . thus here also each switch 1104 handles the login of connected enodes and the virtualizer / ethernet fabric 302 . by embedding vn_port virtualizer functionality into the switches or rbridges that form an ethernet fabric the entire ethernet fabric can act as a virtual vn_port virtualizer , providing vf_ports to the enodes and vn_ports to the fcf or other vf_port device , and can route fcoe packets directly between connected enode devices without a trip to the fc fabric . while certain specific embodiments of particular functions have been mentioned , in most cases other similar embodiments that perform the same function can be used . for example , ens is described as providing message distribution services between the ethernet fabric switches but other message distribution methods and protocols could be used . as another example , the vd is described as a user space module , language usually used with linux / unix variants , but it could be a kernel module in linux / unix or could be the equivalent in windows , vxworks and the like . the above description is intended to be illustrative , and not restrictive . for example , the above - described embodiments may be used in combination with each other . many other embodiments will be apparent to those of skill in the art upon reviewing the above description . the scope of the invention should , therefore , be determined with reference to the appended claims , along with the full scope of equivalents to which such claims are entitled . in the appended claims , the terms “ including ” and “ in which ” are used as the plain - english equivalents of the respective terms “ comprising ” and “ wherein .”