Methods and apparatus for allocating working and protection bandwidth in a network

• US 20030065811A1
• Filed: 09/27/2002
• Published: 04/03/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 05/16/2001
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Tellabs Operations Incorporated (Infinera Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Tellabs Operations Incorporated (Infinera Corp.)
• Inventors: Lin, Philip J., Mills, James D., Chow, Timothy Y.
• Application Number:
  US10/256,411
• Publication Number:
  US 20030065811A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/232
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0896 Bandwidth or capacity management, i.e. automatically increasing or decreasing capacities flow or congestion control using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation, H04L47/76
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/00 Routing or path finding of packets in data switching networks routing or path finding in wireless networks H04W40/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/22 Alternate routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/28 using route fault recovery
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/15 in relation to multipoint traffic arrangements for broadcast or multicast in data networks H04L12/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/70 Admission control; Resource allocation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/728 for backup paths
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/746 Reaction triggered by a failure
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/824 Applicable to portable or mobile terminals

Abstract

A method for protecting a mesh network from connection failures includes reviewing, for each link in the mesh network, the single failure scenarios which would require support from the particular link. The method includes determining from these single failure scenarios the worst-case bandwidth required of the particular link to support them and designating this worst-case bandwidth as the capacity for the particular link.

Claims

1. A method of protecting a mesh network from connection failures, comprising:

determining for a link in the mesh network a worst-case bandwidth for the link to support single failure scenarios; and

designating the worst-case bandwidth as a capacity for the link.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising determining working routes and protection routes in the mesh network.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the mesh network is a multiply-connected network.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the link carries bi-directional traffic.

5. The method of claim 2 wherein determining working routes and protection routes in the mesh network comprises using a jointly shortest pair algorithm.

6. The method of claim 2 further comprising designating a signaling protocol to assign traffic to one of the protection routes due to a failure of one of the working routes.

7. The method of claim 2 wherein each of the working routes is link-disjoint to one of the protection routes and the single failure scenarios comprise all single link failure scenarios.

8. The method of claim 2 wherein each of the working routes is node-disjoint to one of the protection routes and the single failure scenarios comprise all single link and single node failure scenarios.

9. The method of claim 2 further comprising employing stub release to release a bandwidth of one of the working routes due to a failure of the one of the working routes.

10. A method of migrating a mesh network with routes carrying active data and routes carrying copies of the active data from a dedicated 1+1 protection scheme to a shared protection scheme comprising:

extinguishing any live traffic on each of the routes carrying copies of the active data;

designating the routes carrying active data as working routes;

designating the routes carrying copies of the active data as protection routes;

determining for a link in the mesh network a worst-case bandwidth for the link to support single failure scenarios; and

designating the worst-case bandwidth as a capacity for the link.

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising designating a signaling protocol to assign traffic to one of the protection routes due to a failure of one of the working routes.

12. The method of claim 10 wherein each of the working routes is link-disjoint to one of the protection routes and the single failure scenarios comprise all single link failure scenarios.

13. The method of claim 10 wherein each of the working routes is node-disjoint to one of the protection route and the single failure scenarios comprise all single link and single node failure scenarios.

14. A method of protecting a mesh network with working routes and protection routes from connection failures when a connection, link, or node is added or deleted to the mesh network, comprising:

determining a designated working route and a designated protection route to support the connection;

reviewing for links in the designated working route and the designated protection route, single failure scenarios along the designated working route which would require support from each link;

determining for the each link a worst-case bandwidth to support the single failure scenarios; and

designating the worst-case bandwidth as a capacity for the each link.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein determining a designated working route and a designated protection route to support the connection comprises using a jointly shortest pair algorithm.

16. The method of claim 14 further comprising designating a signaling protocol to assign traffic to one of the protection routes due to a failure of one of the working routes.

17. The method of claim 14 wherein each of the working routes is link-disjoint to one of the protection routes and the single failure scenarios comprise all single link failure scenarios.

18. The method of claim 14 wherein each of the working routes is node-disjoint to one of the protection routes and the single failure scenarios comprise all single link and single node failure scenarios.

19. The method of claim 14 further comprising employing stub release to release a bandwidth of one of the working routes due to a failure of the one of the working routes.

20. The method of claim 14 wherein the links in the designated working route and the designated protection route are all of the links in the designated working route and the designated protection route.