Load balancing and destination network address translation middleboxes

• US 10,514,941 B2
• Filed: 11/15/2012
• Issued: 12/24/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 11/15/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nicira Incorporated (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Nicira Incorporated (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Zhang, Ronghua, Koponen, Teemu, Thakkar, Pankaj, Casado, Martin
• Primary Examiner(s): Sison, June Y
• Assistant Examiner(s): Cooney, Adam A
• Application Number:
  US13/678,522
• Publication Number:
  US 20130132532A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,595 Days
• Field of Search: 709220
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 15/177 Initialisation or configuration control processor initialisation G06F9/4405
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/4557 Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45595 Network integration; Enabling network access in virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/455 Emulation; Interpretation; Software simulation, e.g. virtualisation or emulation of application or operating system execution engines
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45533 Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/08 Configuration management of networks or network elements address allocation H04L61/50
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0803 Configuration setting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0806 for initial configuration or provisioning, e.g. plug-and-play
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0813 characterised by the conditions triggering a change of settings
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0823 characterised by the purposes of a change of settings, e.g. optimising configuration for enhancing reliability for optimising operational conditions of wireless networks H04W24/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0889 Techniques to speed-up the configuration process
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0893 Assignment of logical groups to network elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0894 Policy-based network configuration management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0895 Configuration of virtualised networks or elements, e.g. virtualised network function or OpenFlow elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/02 Topology update or discovery
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/64 using an overlay routing layer
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/74 Address processing for routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/15 Interconnection of switching modules
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/70 : Virtual switches
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2503 : Translation of Internet protocol [IP] addresses
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2517 : using port numbers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2521 : Translation architectures other than single NAT servers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/256 : NAT traversal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0218 : Distributed architectures, e.g. distributed firewalls
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1008 : based on parameters of servers, e.g. available memory or workload monitoring of computer activity G06F11/30

Abstract

A controller of a network control system for configuring several middlebox instances is described. The middlebox instances implement a middlebox in a distributed manner in several hosts. The controller configures a first middlebox instance to obtain status of a set of servers and disseminate the obtained status to a second middlebox instance. The controller configures the second middlebox instance to use the status to select a server from the set of servers.

Claims

1. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a controller application of a network control system for configuring a logical middlebox in a distributed manner across a plurality of physical machines, the logical middlebox part of a logical network that logically connects a plurality of machines, the controller application comprising sets of instructions for:

configuring a plurality of middlebox instances, each operating in a different one of the physical machines, to (i) receive a packet directed to a set of servers providing a same service, (ii) select a server from the set of servers to which to send the packet, (iii) create a set of flow entries, using a network address of the selected server, that specify to send subsequent packets having similar characteristics to the received packet to the selected server, and (iv) provide the created set of flow entries to a corresponding managed forwarding element operating in the physical machine with the middlebox instance; and

configuring managed forwarding elements in the plurality of physical machines to forward subsequent packets based on the set of flow entries created by the corresponding middlebox instance without the corresponding middlebox instance processing the subsequent packets.

2. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the middlebox instance in a particular physical machine receives a set of template flow entries from the managed forwarding element in the particular physical machine along with the received packet, the set of template flow entries for use in creating the set of flow entries provided to said managed forwarding element.

3. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the set of flow entries causes the managed forwarding element to replace a destination network address of the subsequent packets directed to the set of servers with the network address of the selected server.

11. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the plurality of middlebox instances select servers from the set of servers in order to balance workload across the set of servers.

4. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a first controller of a network control system for configuring a load balancer in a distributed manner across a plurality of host machines, the load balancer part of a logical network that logically connects a plurality of machines, the network control system comprising a plurality of controllers, the controller comprising sets of instructions for:

receiving configuration data for the load balancer that specifies rules for selecting a server from a set of servers for packets, having a destination address corresponding to the set of servers, that are received at instances of the load balancer;

identifying a plurality of host machines, on at least a subset of which machines of the plurality of machines connected by the logical network operate, on which to implement the load balancer;

identifying a set of additional controllers in the network control system that manage the identified host machines on which to implement the load balancer; and

distributing the configuration data for the load balancer to the identified set of additional controllers in order for the additional controllers to provide the configuration data to middlebox instances on the host machines.

5. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein the configuration data includes a set of network addresses of the set of servers and a virtual network address shared by the set of servers, wherein the destination address of the packets is the virtual network address.

6. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein the configuration data includes a set of selection rules for selecting a server from the set of servers.

7. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 5, wherein a middlebox instance implementing the load balancer in a host machine replaces a destination network address of a received packet directed to the virtual network address with the network address of a selected one of the servers.

8. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein the first controller is a logical controller and the identified set of additional controllers are physical controllers.

9. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein the network control system is for generating physical control plane data for directing first and second managed forwarding elements to implement forwarding operations associated with a first logical datapath set, wherein the controller further comprises a set of instructions for converting logical control plane data for the first logical datapath set to universal physical control plane data.

10. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 9, wherein the first controller is a master controller for the first logical datapath set, wherein each of the identified set of additional controllers is a master controller for a set of managed forwarding elements that operate in the same host machines on which the load balancer is implemented.