Fibre Channel is the primary avionics bus on many modern military aircraft. It is also the defined High-Speed bus for MIL-STD-1760E weapons applications. Profiled Ethernet networks are the primary avionics bus in many commercial aircraft and Commercial Ethernet is an ever increasing presence in modern military aircraft as well. This network standard is a convergence of Fibre Channel and Ethernet into a unified network standard which will provide a seamless approach to integrating end systems from either technology into a merged network structure. This work is based upon the commercial data storage market industry’s work on the Converged Data Storage Network or FCoE (Fibre Channel over Ethernet).
This effort will look at profiling the FCoE work done in the commercial industry and adding information where necessary to affect a networking standard that will seamlessly integrate end systems from Commercial Ethernet, Fibre Channel, or FCoE enhanced devices. Also the network will need to address support for real-time services with the Quality of Service necessary for mission critical, safety critical, and flight critical functions on the same link.
Rationale: This standard defines a High-Speed network that is a convergence of Fibre Channel and Ethernet technologies already developed and deployed in high-end data storage centers as a commercial converged data center network. It needs to be profiled for use in aerospace applications including avionics networks, weapons busses, and sensors networks and enhanced to meet evolving requirements for mixed criticality systems. This activity was initiated at the request of the U.S. Air Force in 2015.
