FICON

FICON (Fibre Connection) is the IBM proprietary name for the ANSI FC-SB-3 Single-Byte Command Code Sets-3 Mapping Protocol for Fibre Channel (FC) protocol. It is a FC layer 4 protocol used to map both IBM’s antecedent (either ESCON or parallel) channel-to-control-unit cabling infrastructure and protocol onto standard FC services and infrastructure. The topology is fabric utilizing FC switches or directors. Valid rates include 1, 2, 4, and 8 Gigabit data rates at distances up to 100 km. FICON has replaced ESCON in current deployments because of FICON's technical superiority (especially its higher performance) and lower cost.