Electronic data transfer based on selective storage of incoming packets

• US 20040095935A1
• Filed: 11/14/2002
• Published: 05/20/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Original Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Inventors: Connor, Patrick L.
• Granted Patent: US 7,286,483 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/392
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/193 at the transport layer, e.g. TCP related
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/30 in combination with information about buffer occupancy at either end or at transit nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/32 by discarding or delaying data units, e.g. packets or frames
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/16 Implementation or adaptation of Internet protocol [IP], of transmission control protocol [TCP] or of user datagram protocol [UDP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/163 In-band adaptation of TCP data exchange; In-band control procedures

Abstract

End-to-end data transfer between computing platforms in a transport control protocol (TCP) environment is improved by restricting which packets are stored in a receive memory of an input/output (I/O) circuit. In one embodiment, received packets are examined as to type, and the number of packets stored in the receive memory is monitored. If the number of stored packets exceeds a threshold value, then subsequently received data packets are discarded, whereas latency-sensitive priority data such as acknowledgements (ACKs) are retained in the receive memory, until the number of stored packets is reduced. Various methods, as well as application of the circuit to a system and to a machine-readable article, are also described.

Claims

1. A circuit comprising:

a parsing module to receive a data stream from a network and to classify data packets in the data stream; and

an analyzer, coupled to the parsing module and to a memory, to determine the available capacity of the memory, and to selectively store a portion of the data packets into the memory based upon the available capacity being less than a threshold amount.

2. The circuit recited in claim 1, wherein the parsing module is to classify the data packets into first and second types of data packets.

3. The circuit recited in claim 2, wherein the analyzer is to store only the first type of data packets when the available capacity is less than a threshold amount.

4. The circuit recited in claim 3, wherein the first type of data packets comprises latency-sensitive data.

5. The circuit recited in claim 3, wherein the first type of data packets is from the group consisting of acknowledgement, length of packet, priority, transmission control protocol port, and security encryption information.

6. The circuit recited in claim 3, wherein the first type of data packets comprises acknowledgement data packets.

7. The circuit recited in claim 3, wherein the second type of data packets is larger in size than the first type of data packets.

8. The circuit recited in claim 3, wherein the second type of data packets does not comprise acknowledgement data packets.

9. The circuit recited in claim 1, wherein the analyzer is also to store a relatively greater portion of the data packets into the memory based upon the available capacity being greater than or equal to the threshold amount.

10. The circuit recited in claim 1, wherein the circuit is an input/output (I/O) device from the group consisting of a client I/O device, a server I/O device, a network interface, a network interface card, a server adapter, a network adapter, a media access card, and an Ethernet media access card.

11. An input/output (I/O) device comprising:

an interface to receive a data stream of intermixed packets from a network;

an I/O device memory to store the packets;

an analyzer to determine an amount of I/O device memory available to store the packets; and

a parsing module to check the contents of the packets and to classify selected packets based on latency-sensitive data,

wherein the analyzer is to store a portion of the packets into the I/O device memory based upon a comparison of the amount of I/O device memory available with a threshold amount.

12. The device of claim 11, wherein the I/O device comprises a device from the group consisting of a client I/O device, a server I/O device, a network interface, a network interface card, a server adapter, a network adapter, a media access card, and an Ethernet media access card.

13. The device of claim 11, wherein the intermixed packets include data packets and latency-sensitive packets.

14. The device of claim 13, wherein the latency-sensitive packets include data from the group consisting of acknowledgment (ACK), length of a received packet, priority designation, transport control protocol port, and security encryption information.

15. The device of claim 14, wherein the analyzer is to determine the number of packets stored in the I/O device memory and is to compare the determined number of stored packets to a first threshold number,

wherein the parsing module is to check the contents of received packets for latency-sensitive data and to separate the packets into data packets and latency-sensitive data packets, and

wherein the analyzer is to store the separated latency-sensitive data packets and to drop the data packets based upon the determined number of stored packets being greater than the first threshold number.

16. The device of claim 15, wherein the analyzer is to determine the number of packets stored in the I/O device memory by determining the number of data packets and ACK packets stored in the I/O device memory.

17. The device of claim 16, wherein the parsing module is to check the contents of packets for ACK data and to separate the received packets into data packets and ACK packets.

18. The device of claim 17, wherein the analyzer is to store the ACK packets and to drop the data packets based upon the determined number of stored packets being greater than or equal to the first threshold number.

19. The device of claim 18, wherein the analyzer is to compare the determined number of stored packets to a second threshold number and to store a relatively greater portion of the received packets based upon the determined number of stored packets being less than or equal to the second threshold number.

20. The device of claim 19, wherein the I/O device further comprises:

a bus interface coupled to the analyzer and the I/O device memory to transmit the stored data packets to a client.

21. The device of claim 19, wherein the I/O device further comprises:

a bus interface coupled to the analyzer and the I/O device memory to transmit the stored ACK packets to a server through the network.

22. The device of claim 14,

wherein the parsing module is to check the contents of received packets for ACK data and to separate the received packets into data packets and ACK packets,

wherein the analyzer is to determine the number of packets stored in the I/O device memory by determining the number of data packets and ACK packets stored in the I/O device memory,

wherein the analyzer is to compare the determined number of stored packets to a first threshold number,

wherein the analyzer is to store the ACK packets and to drop the data packets based upon the determined number of stored packets being greater than or equal to the first threshold number, and

wherein the analyzer is further to compare the determined number of stored packets to a second threshold number and to store a relatively greater portion of the received packets based upon the determined number of stored packets being less than or equal to the second threshold number.

23. A method comprising:

receiving a stream of intermixed packets;

checking the contents of the packets and classifying the packets into one of multiple different types;

determining an amount of memory available to store the packets; and

storing a portion of the types of packets based upon the amount of memory available falling below a threshold amount.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein the packet types comprise data packets and latency-sensitive packets.

25. The method of claim 24, wherein storing comprises:

storing latency-sensitive packets and dropping data packets based upon the amount of memory available falling below the threshold amount.

26. The method of claim 25 wherein, in storing, the latency-sensitive packets comprise latency-sensitive data from the group consisting of acknowledgment (ACK) data, length of a received packet, priority designation, transport control protocol (TCP) port, and security encryption information.

27. The method of claim 26, wherein receiving comprises:

receiving ACK packets in a TCP protocol environment.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein storing comprises:

storing ACK packets and dropping data packets based upon the amount of memory available falling below the threshold amount.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein storing ACK packets and dropping data packets based upon the amount of memory available falling below the threshold amount comprises:

determining the number of packets stored in the memory;

checking the contents of selected packets for ACK data and classifying the packets into data and ACK packets;

comparing the determined number of stored packets in the memory to a first threshold number; and

storing the ACK packets and dropping the data packets based upon the determined number of stored packets exceeding the first threshold number.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein storing the packets further comprises:

comparing the determined number of stored packets to a second threshold number; and

storing a relatively greater portion of the packets based on the outcome of the comparison.

31. The method of claim 30, wherein storing a relatively greater portion of the packets comprises:

storing the data and ACK packets based upon the determined number of stored packets being less than or equal to the second threshold number.

32. An article comprising:

a storage medium having instructions that when executed by a computing platform, result in execution of a method of transferring data between computing platforms, including

receiving a data stream of intermixed packets;

checking the contents of the packets and classifying the packets into first and second types of packets;

determining an amount of memory available to store the packets; and

storing only the first type of packets when the amount of memory available falls below a threshold amount.

33. The article of claim 32, wherein the first and second packet types comprise latency-sensitive packets and data packets, respectively.

34. The article of claim 33, wherein storing comprises:

storing latency-sensitive packets and dropping data packets when the amount of memory available falls below the threshold amount.

35. The article of claim 34, wherein the contents of the latency-sensitive packets comprise:

latency-sensitive data from the group consisting of acknowledgment (ACK) data, length of a received packet, priority designation, transport control protocol (TCP) port, and security encryption information.

36. The article of claim 35, wherein receiving comprises:

receiving data and ACK packets in a TCP protocol environment.

37. A system comprising:

a processor;

a host memory coupled to the processor; and

an input/output (I/O) device coupled to the host memory and to a network interface, the I/O device to control the transfer of data from the network interface to the host memory by performing;

receiving a data stream of intermixed packets from the network interface;

checking the contents of the packets and classifying the packets into first and second types of packets;

determining an amount of memory available to store the packets; and

storing only the first types of packets when the amount of memory available falls below a threshold amount.

38. The system of claim 37, wherein the first and second packet types comprise latency-sensitive packets and data packets.

39. The system of claim 38, wherein the contents of the latency-sensitive packets comprise:

latency-sensitive data from the group consisting of acknowledgment (ACK) data, length of a received packet, priority designation, transport control protocol (TCP) port, and security encryption information.

40. A circuit comprising:

a parsing module to receive a stream of Transport Control Protocol over Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) packets from a network and to classify packets in the TCP/IP packet stream into acknowledgment (ACK) packets and payload packets;

a memory to store the packets; and

an analyzer, coupled to the parsing module and to the memory, to determine the available capacity of the memory, and to selectively store only ACK packets into the memory based upon the available capacity being less than a threshold amount.

41. The circuit recited in claim 40, wherein the analyzer module is to store both ACK and payload packets into the memory based upon the available capacity being greater than or equal to the threshold amount.

42. The circuit recited in claim 40, wherein the circuit is an input/output (I/O) device from the group consisting of a client I/O device, a server I/O device, a network interface, a network interface card, a server adapter, a network adapter, a media access card, and an Ethernet media access card.