METHODS FOR MANAGING MULTICAST TRAFFIC BETWEEN SOURCES SENDING DATA AND HOSTS REQUESTING DATA AND NETWORK EQUIPMENT USED TO IMPLEMENT THE METHODS
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Abstract
A device, system and method for controlling the flow of multicast data packets from sources sending data to hosts requesting the data. In one implementation, a router is situated in a data network between sources that send multicast data packets directed to a multicast group and hosts requesting to receive the multicast data packets. The router has one or more network interfaces in the direction of the hosts and stores for each network interface, each multicast group address and each host at least one data record arising from one or more data requests made by the hosts which includes multicast group and source information. The router stores executable instructions to receive messages originating from a host, update the status of the data sources for that host and implement the actions according to one or a combination of Tables 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 disclosed herein.
141 Citations
66 Claims
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1-36. -36. (canceled)
- 37. A multicast router having one or more downstream network interfaces and situated in a data network system between one or more sources that send multicast packets to one or more multicast group addresses and one or more hosts that request data from the one or more multicast group addresses and the on or more sources, the multicast router storing a first set of executable instructions that when executed read at least a portion of the information contained in one or more data requests made by the one or more hosts that requests multicast data from a multicast group address and to store for each downstream network interface, each multicast group address and each of the one or more hosts at least one record derived from the one or more data requests made by the one or more hosts which include multicast group address and source address information, the multicast router storing a second set of executable instructions that when executed update the at least one record and implement the actions according to one of the processes of Table 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7, the multicast router further storing a third set of executable instructions that are executable to cause multicast packets from one of the sources of a multicast group address to continuously be transmitted through one of the downstream network interfaces.
- 52. A multicast router having one or more downstream network interfaces and situated in a data network system between sources that send multicast packets to one or more multicast group addresses and one or more hosts that request data from the one or more multicast group addresses and the sources, the multicast router storing a first set of executable instructions that when executed read at least a portion of the information contained in one or more data requests made by the one or more hosts that requests multicast data from a multicast group address and to store for each downstream network interface, each multicast group address and each of the one or more hosts at least one record derived from the one or more data requests made by the one or more hosts which include multicast group address and source address information, the multicast router storing a second set of executable instructions that when executed update the at least one record and implement the actions according to one of the processes of Table 6 or Table 7, the multicast router further storing a third set of executable instructions that are executable to cause multicast packets from one of the sources of a multicast group address to continuously be transmitted through one of the downstream network interfaces.
Specification