Bridge routing module

• US 9,414,070 B2
• Filed: 03/28/2014
• Issued: 08/09/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 11/03/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Avago Technologies International Sales Pte Limited (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Broadcom Corporation (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Yousefi, Nariman, Kim, Yongbum, Walley, John, Chen, Sherman (Xuemin), Diab, Wael W., Ilyadis, Nicholas
• Primary Examiner(s): Pham, Brenda H
• Application Number:
  US14/228,598
• Publication Number:
  US 20140211803A1
• Time in Patent Office: 865 Days
• Field of Search: 370/389, 370/360, 370/386, 370/392, 370/396, 370/395.42
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 50/00 Electric propulsion with power supplied within the vehicle with power supply from force of nature, e.g. sun or wind, B60L8/00; for monorail vehicles, suspension vehicles or rack railways B60L13/00
• CPC Class Codes: B60R 16/023 for transmission of signals between vehicle parts or subsystems
• CPC Class Codes: B60R 16/03 for supply of electrical power to vehicle subsystems or for circuit arrangements for charging batteries H02J7/00
• CPC Class Codes: B60R 16/0315 using multiplexing techniques multiplexing for transmission of signals G08C15/00; multiplexing for electrical communication in general H04J
• CPC Class Codes: B60R 19/03 characterised by material, e.g. composite B60R19/18 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/26 Power supply means, e.g. regulation thereof for memories G11C
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/266 Arrangements to supply power to external peripherals either directly from the computer or under computer control, e.g. supply of power through the communication port, computer controlled power-strips
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/4022 using switching circuits, e.g. switching matrix, connection or expansion network G06F13/4009 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 7/76 Arrangements for rearranging, permuting or selecting data according to predetermined rules, independently of the content of the data
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/085 using electronic data carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/0866 the electronic data carrier being a digital video recorder in combination with video camera
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/16 Anti-collision systems road vehicle drive control systems for predicting or avoiding probable or impending collision otherwise than by control of a particular sub-unit B60W30/08
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/3822 specially adapted for use in vehicles H04B1/3827 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/10 Current supply arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/46 Interconnection of networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/4625 Single bridge functionality, e.g. connection of two networks over a single bridge
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/56 Packet switching systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/74 Address processing for routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2433 Allocation of priorities to traffic types
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/6275 : based on priority
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/76 : using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation requested by the user or requested by the network in response to changing network conditions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/821 : Prioritising resource allocation or reservation requests
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/25 : Routing or path finding in a switch fabric
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 : specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/08 : Protocols for interworking; Protocol conversion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/22 : Parsing or analysis of headers
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/102 : characterised by the element, parameter or selection affected or controlled by the adaptive coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/181 : for receiving images from a plurality of remote sources
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/183 : for receiving images from a single remote source
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/08 : Testing, supervising or monitoring using real traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/08 : Load balancing or load distribution transferring a connection for handling the traffic H04W36/22; wireless traffic scheduling H04W72/12
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/40 : for vehicles, e.g. vehicle-to-pedestrians [V2P]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/44 : for communication between vehicles and infrastructures, e.g. vehicle-to-cloud [V2C] or vehicle-to-home [V2H]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/46 : for vehicle-to-vehicle communication [V2V]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/02 : Selection of wireless resources by user or terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/541 : using the level of interference
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/56 : based on priority criteria
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/02 : Terminal devices
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 : in wireless communication networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 40/18 : Network protocols supporting networked applications, e.g. including control of end-device applications over a network

Abstract

A bridge routing module can be incorporated into a closed network fabric, such as a vehicular network. The bridge routing module includes an interface circuit to be coupled to other elements of the closed network fabric, for example other bridge routing modules or switch modules. The bridge routing module includes memory to store information associating packet content types with packet routing parameters, among other things. A processing module included in the bridge routing module analyzes packets to identify the type of content carried by the packets, and determines packet routing parameters based on the packet'"'"'s content type. Ingress and egress of the packet are controlled in accordance with the packet routing parameters determined by the processing module.

Claims

1. A bridge-routing module comprising:

interface circuitry configured for communication within an intra-vehicular network;

packet ingress/egress circuitry configured to receive packets from and transmit packets to the interface circuitry;

memory; and

processing circuitry coupled to the packet ingress/egress circuitry and to the memory and configured to;

analyze a packet to identify a packet content type to determine whether the packet is a vehicle safety packet;

when the packet is a vehicle safety packet and the packet is received from a packet source, add an indication to a header of the packet to identify the packet as a vehicle safety packet;

determine a packet routing parameter based on the packet content type; and

control ingress/egress of the packet in accordance with the packet routing parameter.

2. The bridge-routing module of claim 1, wherein the interface circuitry is configured for communication with at least one of a switch module and another bridge-routing module via the intra-vehicular network.

3. The bridge-routing module of claim 1, the interface circuitry comprising:

a plurality of ports;

switching circuitry coupled to the plurality of ports; and

link management circuitry coupled to the processing circuitry and to the switching circuitry and configured to control the switching circuitry to select an active port of the plurality of ports.

4. The bridge-routing module of claim 3, wherein the link management circuitry is further configured to:

deselect the active port when failing to meet performance criteria; and

control the switching circuitry to select a different port of the plurality of ports as the active port.

5. The bridge-routing module of claim 1, wherein:

the packet ingress/egress circuitry comprises an ingress buffer configured to store packets received from the interface circuitry; and

the processing circuitry is further configured to control placement of packets in the ingress buffer based, at least in part, on priority of the packets.

6. The bridge-routing module of claim 1, wherein:

the packet ingress/egress circuitry comprises a plurality of egress queues configured to store respective packet content types; and

the processing circuitry is further configured to;

control placement of packets in the plurality of egress queues based, at least in part, on a priority of the packets; and

select an egress queue from which a next packet is to be transmitted by the packet ingress/egress circuitry.

7. The bridge-routing module of claim 6, further comprising bypass circuitry coupled to bypass the plurality of egress queues when delivering priority packets.

8. The bridge-routing module of claim 7, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to store a state of the egress queues prior to the bypass circuitry delivering the priority packets.

9. A method for intra-vehicular network communications comprising:

receiving a packet within an intra-vehicular network;

analyzing the packet to identify a packet content type to determine whether the packet is a vehicle safety packet;

when the packet is a vehicle safety packet and the packet is received from a packet source, adding an indication to a header of the packet to identify the packet as a vehicle safety packet;

determining a packet routing parameter based on the packet content type; and

controlling ingress/egress of the packet in accordance with the packet routing parameter.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising selecting an active port of a plurality of ports available for packet ingress/egress.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

deselecting the active port when failing to meet performance criteria; and

selecting a different port of the plurality of ports as the active port.

12. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

storing packets in an ingress buffer; and

controlling placement of the packets in the ingress buffer based, at least in part, on priority of the packets.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein:

controlling placement of packets in a plurality of egress queues based, at least in part, on a priority of the packets; and

selecting an egress queue from which a next packet is to be transmitted.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising bypassing the plurality of egress queues when delivering priority packets.

15. A bridge-routing module comprising:

interface circuitry configured for communication within an intra-vehicular network and including both a wired interface and a wireless interface;

packet ingress/egress circuitry configured to receive packets from and transmit packets to the interface circuitry;

memory; and

processing circuitry coupled to the packet ingress/egress circuitry and to the memory and configured to;

analyze a packet to identify a packet content type to determine whether the packet is a mission critical packet;

when the packet is a mission critical packet and the packet is received from a packet source, add an indication to a header of the packet to identify the packet as a mission critical packet;

determine a packet routing parameter based, at least in part, on the packet content type;

determine whether to use at least one of a wired link and a wireless link to communicate the packet via the interface circuit; and

control ingress/egress of the packet in accordance with the packet routing parameter via at least one of the wired link and the wireless link.

16. The bridge-routing module of claim 15, wherein the interface circuitry is configured for communication with at least one of a switch module and another bridge-routing module via the intra-vehicular network.

17. The bridge-routing module of claim 15, the interface circuitry comprising:

a plurality of ports;

switching circuitry coupled to the plurality of ports; and

link management circuitry coupled to the processing circuitry and to the switching circuitry and configured to control the switching circuitry to select an active port of the plurality of ports.

18. The bridge-routing module of claim 17, wherein the link management circuitry is further configured to:

deselect the active port when failing to meet performance criteria; and

control the switching circuitry to select a different port of the plurality of ports as the active port.

19. The bridge-routing module of claim 17, wherein:

the packet ingress/egress circuitry comprises an ingress buffer configured to store packets received from the interface circuitry; and

the processing circuitry is further configured to control placement of packets in the ingress buffer based, at least in part, on priority of the packets.

20. The bridge-routing module of claim 17, wherein:

the packet ingress/egress circuitry comprises a plurality of egress queues configured to store respective packet content types; and

the processing circuitry is further configured to;

control placement of packets in the plurality of egress queues based, at least in part, on a priority of the packets; and

select an egress queue from which a next packet is to be transmitted by the packet ingress/egress circuitry.