EXTERNALLY INITIATED APPLICATION SESSION ENDPOINT MIGRATION

• US 20150215406A1
• Filed: 03/11/2014
• Published: 07/30/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 01/24/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NetApp, Inc.
• Original Assignee: NetApp, Inc.
• Inventors: Eggert, Lars R., Muley, Naman G., Patil, Preetam
• Granted Patent: US 9,635,114 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2521 Translation architectures other than single NAT servers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/147 Signalling methods or messages providing extensions to protocols defined by standardisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/56 Provisioning of proxy services store-and-forward switching systems in data switching networks H04L12/54

Abstract

In storage networks (e.g., SAN and NAS), various reasons can arise for migrating an application layer communication session endpoint to a different host. To achieve scalability and robustness, the migration can be enacted externally and carried out at a middlebox at the transport layer. When a migration is triggered to migrate an application layer communication session endpoint from a host A to a host B, the middlebox coordinates network address translation with a transport protocol reset mechanism to switch the connection to host B and close the connection on host A with minimal disruption to the non-migrating application layer communication session endpoint using the connection. At the application layer, the non-migrating application layer communication session endpoint will initiate a new connection in response to detecting the reset, and retry any operation that was aborted as a result of the connection switch.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

determining that an endpoint of an application communication session is to be migrated from a first host to a second host, wherein the application communication session uses a transport layer connection for a communications between the first host and a third host;

configuring, in a middlebox, a first network address translation rule to translate an address of the first host to an address of the second host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection and being transmitted to the first host from the third host;

configuring, in the middlebox, a second network address translation rule to translate the address of the second host to the address of the first host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection and being transmitted to the third host from the second host;

creating, in the middlebox, an acknowledgement message as if from the third host and with an acknowledgement number that is not expected by the first host;

transmitting the acknowledgment message to the first host;

after receipt of an acknowledgement message from the first host, creating a reset message as if from the third host, wherein the reset message is created with a sequence field set to an acknowledgment number indicated in the acknowledgement message from the first host; and

transmitting the reset message to the first host.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the acknowledgement messages are in accordance with the transmission control protocol.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

after receipt of the acknowledgement message from the first host, creating a second reset message, in the middlebox as if from the first host, with a sequence field set to a sequence number indicated in the acknowledgement message from the first host; and

transmitting the second reset message to the third host.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said creating the second reset message, in the middlebox as if from the first host, comprises creating the second reset message with fields set to indicate the first host as a source of the second reset message.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein said creating, in the middlebox, the acknowledgement message as if from the third host comprises creating the acknowledgement message with fields set to indicate the third host as the source of the acknowledgement message.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising receiving a request that indicates the transport layer connection, wherein said determining that the endpoint of the application communication session is to be migrated from the first host to the second host comprises locating an entry in a structure that indicates the transport layer connection indicated in the request.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein said

configuring, in the middlebox, the first network address translation rule to translate an address of the first host to an address of the second host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection being transmitted to the first host from the fourth host also comprises configuring the first network address translation to translate a first port of the first host to a second port of the second host;

configuring, in the middlebox, the second network address translation rule to translate the address of the second host to the address of the first host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection being transmitted to the third host from the second host also comprises configuring the second network address translation rule to translate the second port of the second host to the first port of the first host.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

determining that the application communication endpoint is to be migrated from the second host back to the first host; and

removing the first and the second network address translation rules.

9. A computer program product, the computer program product comprising:

a computer readable storage medium having program code embodied therewith, the program code comprising a program code to;

determine that an endpoint of an application layer communication session is to be migrated from a first host to a second host;

determine whether the second host is associated with a transport layer connection already being used by the endpoint of the application layer communication session;

if the second host is not associated with a transport layer connection already being used by endpoint of the application layer communication session,

configure a first network address translation rule to translate an address of the first host to an address of the second host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection and being transmitted to the first host from a third host associated with the transport layer connection;

configure a second network address translation rule to translate the address of the second host to the address of the first host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection and being transmitted to the third host from the second host;

if the second host is associated with the transport layer connection already used by the endpoint of the application layer communication session, remove network address translation rules being applied to the transport layer connection;

create an acknowledgement message as if from the third host and with an acknowledgement number that is not expected by the first host;

cause transmission of the acknowledgment message to the first host;

after receipt of an acknowledgement message from the first host, create a reset message as if from the third host with a sequence field set to an acknowledgment number indicated in the acknowledgement message from the first host; and

cause transmission of the reset message to the first host.

10. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the acknowledgement messages are in accordance with the transmission control protocol.

11. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the program code further comprises program code to:

after receipt of the acknowledgement message from the first host, create a second reset message as if from the first host with a sequence field set to a sequence number indicated in the acknowledgement message from the first host; and

transmit the second reset message to the third host.

12. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the program code to create the second reset message as if from the first host, comprises program code to create the second reset message with fields set to indicate the first host as a source of the second reset message.

13. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the program code to create the acknowledgement message as if from the third host comprises program code to create the acknowledgement message with fields set to indicate the third host as a source of the acknowledgement message.

14. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the program code further comprises program code to read a request that indicates the network connection, wherein the program code to determine that the endpoint of the application layer communication session is to be migrated from the first host to the second host comprises program code to locate an entry in a structure that indicates the transport layer connection indicated in the request.

15. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the program code to create an acknowledgement message as if from the third host and with an acknowledgement number that is not expected by the first host comprises program code to generate a number outside of a window associated with the transport layer connection.

16. A network device comprising:

a processor;

a plurality of network interfaces; and

a computer readable storage medium having program code embodied therewith, the program code executable by the processor to cause the network device to,

determine that an endpoint of an application layer communication session is to be migrated from a first host to a second host;

determine whether the second host is associated with a transport layer connection already being used by the endpoint of the application layer communication session;

if the second host is not associated with a transport layer connection already being used by the endpoint of the application layer communication session,

configure a first network address translation rule to translate an address of the first host to an address of the second host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection and being transmitted to the first host from a third host;

configure a second network address translation rule to translate the address of the second host to the address of the first host for protocol data units associated with the transport layer connection and being transmitted to the third host from the second host;

if the second host is indicated as associated with a transport layer connection already being used by the endpoint of the application layer communication session, remove network address translation rules being applied to the transport layer connection;

create an acknowledgement message as if from the third host and with an acknowledgement number that is not expected by the first host;

cause transmission of the acknowledgment message to the first host via one of the plurality of network interfaces;

after receipt of an acknowledgement message from the first host, create a reset message as if from the third host with a sequence field set to an acknowledgment number indicated in the acknowledgement message from the first host; and

cause transmission of the reset message to the first host via one of the plurality of network interfaces.

17. The network device of claim 16, wherein the program code further comprises program code to:

after receipt of the acknowledgement message from the first host, create a second reset message as if from the first host with a sequence field set to a sequence number indicated in the acknowledgement message from the first host; and

transmit the second reset message to the third host.

18. The network device of claim 17, wherein the program code executable by the processor to cause the network device to create the second reset message as if from the first host, comprises program code executable by the processor to cause the network device to create the second reset message with fields set to indicate the first host as a source of the second reset message.

19. The network device of claim 16, wherein the program code executable by the processor to cause the network device to create the acknowledgement message as if from the third host comprises program code executable by the processor to cause the network device to create the acknowledgement message with fields set to indicate the third host as a source of the acknowledgement message.

20. The network device of claim 16, wherein the program code to create an acknowledgement message as if from the third host and with an acknowledgement number that is not expected by the first host comprises program code to generate a number outside of a window associated with the transport layer connection.