Method and Apparatus for Bond Management According to Hierarchy

• US 20080240095A1
• Filed: 06/11/2008
• Published: 10/02/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 07/26/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Parity Networks LLC
• Original Assignee: Sherwood Partners Incorporated
• Inventors: Basturk, Erol
• Granted Patent: US 7,760,631 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/389
• 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 45/245 Link aggregation, e.g. trunking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/50 using label swapping, e.g. multi-protocol label switch [MPLS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/54 Organization of routing tables
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/742 Route cache; Operation thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/745 Address table lookup; Address filtering
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/125 by balancing the load, e.g. traffic engineering
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2441 relying on flow classification, e.g. using integrated services [IntServ]

Abstract

In a communication system having a plurality of physical communication ports, a hierarchical bond communication interface has a logical interface as a component of the bond at a top level of the hierarchy, and a first subjugate logical interface at a second level of the hierarchy as a component of the top-level logical interface. The communication system has a control mechanism whereby thresholds may be set to determine up or down status of hierarchical bonds for use in communication, according to characteristics of components of the bonds.

Claims

1. A method for managing data flow through a data network packet router, comprising steps of:

(a) creating a set of first-level logical interfaces as aggregations of other logical interfaces and physical ports;

(b) creating one or more second-level logical interfaces as sub-sets within individual ones of the first-level logical interfaces, wherein any physical port may not be a part of more than one logical interface;

(c) creating lower level logical interfaces culminating in lowest-level interfaces composed entirely of physical ports;

(d) causing the router to forward packet flow with reference to the capacity of the logical interfaces; and

(e) managing performance of the router by restructuring the hierarchical set of logical interfaces.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the data network is the Internet network.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein one aspect of performance managed is load-balancing.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein individual ones of the physical ports are components of line cards connectable to other network nodes than the packet router.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein individual ones of the physical ports are components of internal fabric of the router.