Mechanism for PCIE cable topology discovery in a rack scale architecture environment

摘要

A mechanism for PCIe cable topology discovery in a Rack Scale Architecture (RSA) and associated methods, apparatus, and systems. Pooled system drawers installed in rack are interconnected via multiple PCIe cables coupled to PCIe ports on the pooled system drawers. The PCIe ports are associated with host ports connections between server nodes and host ports in respective pooled system drawers are automatically detected, with corresponding PCIe connection information being automatically generated and aggregated to determine the PCIe cable topology for the rack. In one aspect, PCIe devices are emulated for each host port in a pooled storage drawer including pooled PCIe storage devices. Server nodes in a pooled compute drawer send PCIe configuration messages over the PCIe cables, with returned reply messages generated by the emulated PCIe devices identifying the host ports. Information pertaining to the host ports, pooled system drawers, and server nodes is used to determine the PCIe cable topology.