A storage router and storage network provide virtual local storage on remote
storage
devices to Fiber Channel devices. A plurality of Fiber Channel devices, such as
workstations, are connected to a Fiber Channel transport medium, and a plurality
of storage devices are connected to a second Fiber Channel transport medium. The
storage router interfaces between the Fiber Channel transport media. The storage
router maps between the workstations and the storage devices and implements access
controls for storage space on the storage devices. The storage router then allows
access from the workstations to the storage devices using native low level, block
protocol in accordance with the mapping and the access controls.