RESOURCE ALLOCATION IN VIRTUAL ROUTERS

• US 20110016215A1
• Filed: 07/20/2010
• Published: 01/20/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/01/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Verizon Patent and Licensing Incorporated (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Verizon Business Global LLC (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Inventors: WANG, Yang
• Granted Patent: US 8,427,972 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/226
• 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 45/586 of virtual routers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/80 Ingress point selection by the source endpoint, e.g. selection of ISP or POP

Abstract

A router system implements a plurality of virtual routers. Various combinations of resources may be shared by the router system when implementing the virtual routers. In one embodiment, the particular combination of resources to share when implementing the virtual router is user programmable.

Claims

1-27. -27. (canceled)

28. A method, performed by a single device in a network, the method comprising:

allocating a set of logical resources between a plurality of virtual routers implemented in the single device;

allocating a set of physical resources between the plurality of virtual routers implemented in the single device; and

specifying, based on a plurality of resource sharing configurations that specify different sets of network requirements, which logical resources, of the set of logical resources, and which physical resources, of the set of physical resources, are to be shared between the plurality of virtual routers.

29. The method of claim 28, where allocating a set of logical resources comprises:

allocating one or more routing processes to route received data packets.

30. The method of claim 28, where allocating a set of logical resources comprises:

allocating one or more forwarding processes associated with forwarding a received data packet to a destination associated with the received data packet.

31. The method of claim 28, where allocating a set of physical resources comprises:

allocating one or more control resources associated with at least one routing table associated with the single device.

32. The method of claim 28, where allocating a set of physical resources comprises:

allocating one or more data resources associated with at least one physical specification of the single device.

33. The method of claim 32, where the at least one physical specification of the single device includes at least one of:

a number of ports of the single device,

a port bandwidth of the single device, or

a bandwidth of an internal fabric switch of the single device.

34. The method of claim 28, where the resource sharing configurations are reconfigurable by a user.

35. A routing system, comprising:

a set of logical resources between a plurality of virtual routers implemented by a single device; and

a set of physical resources between the plurality of virtual routers implemented by the single device,

where a plurality of resource sharing configurations reconfigurably specifies different sets of network requirements that specify which logical resources, of the set of logical resources, and which physical resources, of the set of physical resources, are to be shared between the plurality of virtual routers.

36. The routing system of claim 35, where the set of logical resources comprises:

one or more routing processes to route received data packets.

37. The routing system of claim 35, where the set of logical resources comprises:

one or more forwarding processes associated with forwarding a received data packet to a destination associated with the received data packet.

38. The routing system of claim 35, where the set of physical resources further comprises:

one or more control resources associated with at least one routing table associated with the single device.

39. The routing system of claim 35, where the set of physical resources further comprises:

one or more data resources associated with at least one physical specification of the single device.

40. The routing system of claim 39, where the at least one physical specification of the single device includes at least one of:

a number of ports of the single device,

a port bandwidth of the single device, or

a bandwidth of an internal fabric switch of the single device.

41. The routing system of claim 35, where the resource sharing configurations are reconfigurable by a user.

42. A network point-of-presence (POP) device comprising:

a single physical router having a plurality of resources, including;

logical resources, and

physical resources;

at least one backbone router, implemented as a virtual router by the single physical router, at an end-point of a high capacity network link; and

at least one regional router implemented as a virtual router by the single physical router,

where the backbone router and the regional router reconfigurably share resources, of the single physical router, based on a plurality of resource sharing configurations that reconfigurably specifies different sets of network requirements that specify which logical resources and which physical resources are to be shared between the backbone router and the regional router.

43. The network POP device of claim 42, where the logical resources include:

routing processes to determine routing for received packets; and

forwarding processes to forward the received packets to an appropriate destination.

44. The network POP device of claim 42, where the physical resources include:

control resources, including a routing table; and

data resources associated with at least one physical specification of the single physical router.

45. The network POP device of claim 44, where the control resources further include a forwarding table.

46. The network POP device of claim 44, where the at least one physical specification includes:

a number of ports of the single physical router,

a port bandwidth of the single physical router, or

a bandwidth of an internal fabric switch of the single physical router.

47. The network POP device of claim 42, where the resource sharing configurations are reconfigurable by a user.