LOAD BALANCING IN A LOGICAL PIPELINE

• US 20130148505A1
• Filed: 02/01/2013
• Published: 06/13/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/17/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nicira Incorporated (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Nicira Incorporated (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Koponen, Teemu, Zhang, Ronghua
• Granted Patent: US 9,059,999 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/235
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0803 Configuration setting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/04 Interdomain routing, e.g. hierarchical routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/54 Organization of routing tables
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/74 Address processing for routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/12 Avoiding congestion; Recovering from congestion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/125 by balancing the load, e.g. traffic engineering
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/103 across network layers, e.g. resolution of network layer into physical layer addresses or address resolution protocol [ARP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/256 NAT traversal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2592 using tunnelling or encapsulation

Abstract

A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a program that configures a managed forwarding element to perform logical L2 switching and L3 routing is described. The program generates a first set of flow entries for configuring the first managed forwarding element to perform (1) a first logical L2 processing for a first logical L2 domain, (2) a logical L3 processing, (3) a load balancing processing to select a second managed forwarding element from a plurality of managed forwarding elements to which to forward packets and (4) a logical ingress L2 processing for a second logical L2 domain on the packets. The program generates a second set of flow entries for configuring the second managed forwarding element to perform a second logical L2 processing for a second logical L2 domain on the packets.

Claims

1. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a program which when executed by at least one processing unit configures a managed forwarding element to perform logical L2 switching and L3 routing, the program comprising sets of instructions for:

generating a first set of flow entries for configuring the first managed forwarding element to perform (i) a first logical L2 processing for a first logical L2 domain, (ii) a logical L3 processing, (iii) a load balancing processing to select a second managed forwarding element from a plurality of managed forwarding elements to which to forward packets and (iv) a logical ingress L2 processing for a second logical L2 domain on the packets; and

generating a second set of flow entries for configuring the second managed forwarding element to perform a second logical L2 processing for a second logical L2 domain on the packets.

2. The machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first set of flow entries is further for configuring the first managed forwarding element to perform a source network address translation (NAT) processing before performing the load balancing processing.

3. The machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the plurality of managed forwarding elements are coupled to a plurality of virtual machines that provide a service to any virtual machine that is coupled to the first managed forwarding element.

4. The machine readable medium of claim 3, wherein the first managed forwarding element is configured in a host, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for configuring, in the host, a load balancing daemon to select the second managed forwarding element from the plurality of managed forwarding elements based on current workload on each of the plurality of managed forwarding elements.

5. The machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein the set of instructions for configuring the load balancing daemon comprises a set of instructions for configuring the load balancing daemon to send an address of the second managed forwarding element to the first managed forwarding element.

6. The machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein performing the load balancing processing comprises requesting for a selection of the second managed forwarding element from the plurality of managed forwarding elements.

7. The machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for generating a tunnel between the first managed forwarding element and each of the plurality of managed forwarding elements.

8. The machine readable medium of claim 7, wherein the set of instructions for generating the tunnel comprises a set of instructions for generating a set of flow entries for one of the first managed forwarding element and the plurality of managed forwarding elements to establish the tunnel.

9. For a network controller for managing a network comprising managed forwarding elements, the method comprising:

configuring a managed forwarding element in a host as a second-level managed forwarding element;

configuring a router in the host, the router for performing load balancing by selecting a destination machine from a plurality of possible destination machines that provide identical services and route a packet to the selected destination machine when the router receives a packet from the first logical domain that is addressed to the second logical domain; and

communicatively coupling the second-level managed forwarding element with the router

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the second-level managed forwarding element is facilitates communications between two edge forwarding elements, wherein the edge forwarding elements interfaces directly with sources and destinations of packets, wherein the second-level managed switching element does not directly interface with the sources and destinations of packets.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein configuring the router in the host comprises configuring the router in a namespace of the host2.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the namespace is a machine virtualized in the host.

13. The method of claim 11 further comprising establishing a tunnel between the second-level managed forwarding element and a managed edge forwarding element.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the managed edge forwarding element is a software switch that executes on another host machine along with a set of virtual machines.

15. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a program which when executed by at least one processing unit configures a managed forwarding element to perform logical L2 switching and L3 routing, the program comprising sets of instructions for:

generating a first set of flow entries for configuring the first managed forwarding element to perform (i) a first logical L2 processing for a first logical L2 domain, (ii) a logical L3 processing, (iii) a load balancing processing to select a second managed forwarding element from a plurality of managed forwarding elements to which to forward packets and (iv) a logical ingress L2 processing for a second logical L2 domain on the packets; and

generating a second set of flow entries for configuring the second managed forwarding element to perform a second logical L2 processing for a second logical L2 domain on the packets.

16. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 15, wherein the first set of flow entries is further for configuring the first managed forwarding element to perform a source network address translation (NAT) processing before performing the load balancing processing.

17. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 15, wherein the plurality of managed forwarding elements are coupled to a plurality of virtual machines that provide a service to any virtual machine that is coupled to the first managed forwarding element.

21. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 15 further comprising generating a tunnel between the first managed forwarding element and each of the plurality of managed forwarding elements.

18. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 18, wherein the first managed forwarding element is configured in a host, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for configuring, in the host, a load balancing daemon to select the second managed forwarding element from the plurality of managed forwarding elements based on current workload on each of the plurality of managed forwarding elements.

19. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 18, wherein configuring the load balancing daemon comprises configuring the load balancing daemon to send an address of the second managed forwarding element to the first managed forwarding element.

20. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 18, wherein performing the load balancing processing comprises requesting for a selection of the second managed forwarding element from the plurality of managed forwarding elements.