Patent ID: 7991809

Claim:
A method for managing zone integrity in a storage area network, wherein the storage area network includes a switched fabric having a logical zoning that partitions the switched fabric into one or more zones that belong to one or more zone sets, the method comprising: selecting at least one of the one or more zones associated with the switched fabric, wherein the selected zone has one or more members; creating one or more member definitions to uniquely identify the one or more members in the selected zone based on attributes uniquely associated with the one or more member, wherein the one or more member definitions remain bound to the one or more members regardless of changes to a physical topology associated with the switched fabric; and converting the selected zone into a topologically dynamic zone, wherein converting the selected zone into the topologically dynamic zone includes: clearing the one or more members from the selected zone; and replacing the one or more members cleared from the selected zone with the one or more member definitions to populate the selected zone and convert the selected zone into the topologically dynamic zone, wherein having the one or more member definitions in the topologically dynamic zone remain bound to the one or more members enables relocating the one or more members within the physical topology associated with the switched fabric without affecting the logical zoning that partitions the switched fabric.