System and method for compressing content centric networking messages

• US 9,930,146 B2
• Filed: 04/04/2016
• Issued: 03/27/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 04/04/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Inventors: Solis, Ignacio
• Primary Examiner(s): DINH, KHANH Q
• Application Number:
  US15/090,248
• Publication Number:
  US 20170289316A1
• Time in Patent Office: 722 Days
• Field of Search: 709220, 709247, 709231, 707623, 707653
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/5652 Cell construction, e.g. including header, packetisation, depacketisation, assembly, reassembly
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/745 Address table lookup; Address filtering
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/63 Routing a service request depending on the request content or context
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/04 Protocols for data compression, e.g. ROHC
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/22 Parsing or analysis of headers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A computer system can compress or decompress a type-length-value (TLV) component in a message. During operation, the computer can select a compression table associated with a network interface used to send and/or to receive the message, and can search the compression table for an entry that includes a prefix of a value from type-length-value (TLV) component being compressed or decompressed. If compressing the message, the computer may generate a compressed block that corresponds to a compressed version of the TLV component, such that the compressed block includes the compression encoding in place of the prefix in the TLV component'"'"'s value. The computer can also generate a compressed message that includes the compressed block in place of the TLV component, without a compression table.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

selecting, by a computer and from a message, a type-length-value (TLV) component to compress;

searching a compression table for an entry that includes a prefix of the TLV component'"'"'s value;

obtaining a compression encoding for the TLV value from the compression table entry;

generating a compressed block that corresponds to a compressed version of the TLV component, wherein the compressed block includes the compression encoding in place of the prefix in the TLV component'"'"'s value; and

generating a compressed message that includes the compressed block in place of the TLV component.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining an interface for forwarding the message, based on the message'"'"'s name; and

selecting the compression table that corresponds to the interface.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

in response to generating the compressed message, forwarding the compressed message via the interface.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein generating the compressed block involves:

determining that the compression encoding corresponds to a subset of the TLV'"'"'s value; and

setting a continuation field of the compressed block, wherein the continuation field indicates that additional data follows the compressed block.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein generating the compressed block further involves:

in response to determining that a suffix of the TLV component'"'"'s value does not have a matching entry in the compression table;

determining a size of the suffix;

appending, to the end of the compressed block, a size field that includes the suffix'"'"'s size; and

appending the suffix to the size field.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein generating the compressed block further involves:

in response to determining that a sequence of characters following the TLV component'"'"'s value have a matching entry in the compression table;

appending, to the compressed block, a size field with a zero value; and

appending, to the size field, one or more additional compressed blocks that compress a remaining portion of the TLV component'"'"'s value.

7. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that when executed by a computer cause the computer to perform a method, the method comprising:

selecting, from a message, a type-length-value (TLV) component to compress;

searching a compression table for an entry that includes a prefix of the TLV component'"'"'s value;

obtaining a compression encoding for the TLV value from the compression table entry;

generating a compressed block that corresponds to a compressed version of the TLV component, wherein the compressed block includes the compression encoding in place of the prefix in the TLV component'"'"'s value; and

generating a compressed message that includes the compressed block in place of the TLV component.

8. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, further comprising:

determining an interface for forwarding the message, based on the message'"'"'s name; and

selecting the compression table that corresponds to the interface.

9. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 8, further comprising:

in response to generating the compressed message, forwarding the compressed message via the interface.

10. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein generating the compressed block involves:

determining that the compression encoding corresponds to a subset of the TLV'"'"'s value; and

setting a continuation field of the compressed block, wherein the continuation field indicates that additional data follows the compressed block.

11. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein generating the compressed block further involves:

in response to determining that a suffix of the TLV component'"'"'s value does not have a matching entry in the compression table;

determining a size of the suffix;

appending, to the end of the compressed block, a size field that includes the suffix'"'"'s size; and

appending the suffix to the size field.

12. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein generating the compressed block further involves:

in response to determining that a sequence of characters following the TLV component'"'"'s value have a matching entry in the compression table;

appending, to the compressed block, a size field with a zero value; and

appending, to the size field, one or more additional compressed blocks that compress a remaining portion of the TLV component'"'"'s value.

13. A method, comprising:

receiving, by a computing device via a network interface, a compressed message;

selecting a compression table associated with the interface;

decompressing a message portion from a respective compressed block of the compressed message, using the compression table;

in response to determining that the respective compressed block corresponds to a TLV component;

computing a length of the message portion; and

recreating the TLV component using the message portion and the computed length; and

generating a decompressed message, which includes the TLV component in place of the compressed block.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

synchronizing entries of the compression table with a computer node accessible via the interface.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein decompressing the message portion from the respective compressed block involves:

detecting that a continuation field of the compressed block indicates that additional data follows the compressed block; and

reading a size field following the compressed block in the compressed message.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein decompressing the message portion from the respective compressed block further involves:

in response to determining that the size field includes a non-zero value;

reading a number of bytes that follow the compressed block, corresponding to the size to obtain a data suffix; and

appending the data suffix to the message portion.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein decompressing the message portion from the respective compressed block further involves:

in response to determining that the size field includes a zero value;

decompressing a second compressed block that follows the respective compressed block in the compressed message, to obtain a second message portion; and

appending the second message portion to the message portion.

18. The method of claim 13, wherein decompressing the message portion from the respective compressed block involves:

detecting that a continuation field of the compressed block indicates that additional data does not follow the compressed block; and

appending the decompressed message portion to the decompressed message.