Chassis controllers for converting universal flows

• US 9,288,104 B2
• Filed: 10/25/2012
• Issued: 03/15/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 10/25/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nicira Incorporated (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Nicira Incorporated (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Koponen, Teemu, Thakkar, Pankaj, Gude, Natasha, Lambeth, W. Andrew, Padmanabhan, Amar, Shieh, Alan, Stribling, Jeremy, Yip, Alexander, Zhang, Ronghua, Casado, Martin
• Primary Examiner(s): Taylor, Nicholas
• Assistant Examiner(s): Williams, Clayton R
• Application Number:
  US13/661,002
• Publication Number:
  US 20130117429A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,237 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/00 Arrangements for maintenance, administration or management of data switching networks, e.g. of packet switching networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/042 comprising distributed management centres cooperatively managing the network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0813 characterised by the conditions triggering a change of settings
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/60 Router architectures

Abstract

A network control system for generating physical control plane data for managing first and second managed forwarding elements that implement forwarding operations associated with a first logical datapath set is described. The system includes (1) a first controller for converting logical control plane data for the first logical datapath set to universal physical control plane (UPCP) data, (2) a second controller for converting UPCP data to customized physical control plane (CPCP) data for the first managed forwarding element but not the second managed forwarding element, and (3) a third controller for receiving UPCP data generated by the first controller instance, identifying the second controller as the controller instance responsible for generating the CPCP data for the first managed forward element, and supplying the received UPCP data to the second controller. Each controller includes a network information base (NIB) storage for exchanging data with another controller instance.

Claims

1. A network control system for generating physical control plane data for managing a set of managed forwarding elements that implements forwarding operations associated with a logical datapath set, the system comprising:

a plurality of host computers, each of the plurality of host computers executing a managed forwarding element;

a first controller computer comprising (i) one or more processing units, (ii) a memory for storing a first controller instance executable by the one or more processing units of the first controller computer, and (iii) a network information base (NIB) storage, the first controller instance comprising sets of instructions for;

receiving input data defining the logical datapath set and performing a first conversion of data for the logical datapath set to generate intermediate data tuples for the logical datapath set;

storing the intermediate data tuples in the NIB storage; and

distributing the intermediate data tuples from the NIB storage to a set of the plurality of host computers that executes the set of managed forwarding elements; and

a second controller instance executing on a particular one of the plurality of host computers, the second controller instance comprising sets of instructions for;

receiving the intermediate data tuples for the logical datapath set from the NIB storage; and

converting the intermediate data tuples into physical control plane data for use by a managed forwarding element executing on the particular one of the plurality of host computers.

2. The network control system of claim 1, wherein the particular host computer is a first host computer and the managed forwarding element is a first managed forwarding element, the network control system further comprising a third controller instance executing on a second host computer of the set of host computers, the third controller instance comprising sets of instructions for:

receiving the intermediate data tuples for the logical datapath set from the NIB storage; and

converting the intermediate data tuples into physical control plane data for use by a second managed forwarding element executing on the second host computer.

3. The network control system of claim 2, wherein the controller computer is a first controller computer and the NIB storage is a first NIB storage, the system further comprising:

a second controller computer comprising (i) one or more processing units, (ii) a memory for storing a fourth controller instance executable by one or more processing units of the second controller computer, and (iii) a second NIB storage, the fourth controller instance comprising sets of instructions for;

receiving the intermediate data tuples from the first NIB storage;

storing the intermediate data tuples in the second NIB storage; and

distributing, from the second NIB storage, the intermediate data tuples to the second controller instance; and

a third controller computer comprising (i) one or more processing units, (ii) a memory for storing a fifth controller instance executable by one or more processing units of the third controller computer, and (iii) a third NIB storage, the fifth controller instance comprising sets of instructions for;

receiving the intermediate data tuples from the first NIB storage;

storing the intermediate data tuples in the third NIB storage; and

distributing, from the third NIB storage, the intermediate data tuples to the third controller instance.

4. The network control system of claim 3, wherein

the first controller instance is a master controller instance for the logical datapath set;

the fourth controller instance is a master controller instance for the first managed forwarding element; and

the fifth controller instance is a master controller instance for the second managed forwarding element.

5. The network control system of claim 4, wherein each controller instance further comprises a set of instructions for identifying other controller instances that are masters of different logical datapath sets and different managed forwarding elements.

6. The network control system of claim 2, wherein the physical control plane data for use by the first managed forwarding element executing on the first host computer comprises different data than the physical control plane data for use by the second managed forwarding element executing on the second host computer.

7. The network control system of claim 3, wherein each of the second and third NIB storages is at least partially replicated with the other NIB storage.

8. The network control system of claim 1, wherein the input data comprises logical control plane data, the intermediate data tuples comprise universal physical control plane (UPCP) data, and the physical control plane data for use by the managed forwarding element comprises customized physical control plane (CPCP) data.

9. The network control system of claim 8, wherein the UPCP data comprises data tuples written in terms of generic expressions of an attribute of each of the set of managed forwarding elements, and the CPCP data comprises a customized expression of the attribute specific to the particular managed forwarding element.

10. The network control system of claim 1, wherein the intermediate data tuples are a first set of intermediate data tuples, wherein the first controller instance further comprises sets of instructions for:

converting the input data into a second set of intermediate data tuples for the logical datapath set; and

converting the second set of intermediate data tuples into the first set of intermediate data tuples.

11. The network control system of claim 10, wherein the input data comprises logical control plane data, the second set of intermediate data tuples comprises logical forwarding plane data, the first set of intermediate data tuples comprises universal physical control plane data, and the physical control plane data for use by the managed forwarding element comprises customized physical control plane data.

12. The network control system of claim 11, wherein the second controller instance further comprises a set of instructions for communicating with the managed forwarding element to distribute the physical control plane data to the managed forwarding element within the host.

13. The network control system of claim 12, wherein the second controller instance further comprises a set of instructions for receiving managed forwarding element-specific data from the managed forwarding element in order to generate the physical control plane data.

14. The network control system of claim 13, wherein the managed forwarding element-specific data comprises a physical port number.

15. The network control system of claim 1, wherein the second controller instance further comprises a set of instructions for mapping the intermediate data tuples to physical control plane data using a table mapping engine.

16. A non-transitory machine readable medium of a host machine storing a first controller application executable by at least one processor of the host machine, the first controller application for managing a managed forwarding element that executes on the host machine, the first controller application comprising sets of instructions for:

receiving, from a second controller application that executes on a separate controller computer having one or more processing units for executing the second controller application and a memory for storing the second controller application, a set of intermediate data tuples for a logical datapath set implemented by the managed forwarding element, wherein the intermediate data tuples are generated by a third controller application based on input data that defines the logical datapath set;

converting the intermediate data tuples for the logical datapath set into physical control plane data for use by the managed forwarding element on the host machine; and

distributing the physical control plane data to the managed forwarding element within the host machine, wherein the first controller application uses a network information base (NIB) storage for receiving the set of intermediate data tuples and distributing the physical control plane data.

17. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 16, wherein the second and third controller applications are the same.

18. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 16, wherein the second controller application receives the intermediate data tuples from the third controller application and distributes the intermediate data tuples to the first controller application.

19. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 18, wherein the first controller application is a chassis controller, the second controller application is a master of the managed forwarding element, and the third controller application is a master of the logical datapath set.

20. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 18, wherein each of the second and third controller applications comprises a NIB storage for storing data and exchanging data with the other controller application.

21. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 16, wherein the input data comprises logical control plane data, the intermediate data tuples comprises universal physical control plane (UPCP) data, and the physical control plane data for use by the managed forwarding element comprises customized physical control plane (CPCP) data.

22. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 21, wherein the UPCP data comprises data tuples written in terms of generic expressions of an attribute of each of the set of managed forwarding elements, and the CPCP data comprises a customized expression of the attribute specific to the particular managed forwarding element.