System and method for remote traffic management in a communication network

• US 20020107857A1
• Filed: 01/09/2001
• Published: 08/08/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 01/09/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Force10 Networks, Inc. (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Turin Networks, Inc. (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Inventors: Teraslinna, Kari T.
• Granted Patent: US 7,065,569 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/100
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/22 Traffic shaping
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/50 Queue scheduling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/621 Individual queue per connection or flow, e.g. per VC
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/627 policing

Abstract

A traffic manager to manage flows to a plurality of remote physical ports. The traffic manager employs two tiers of shaping and scheduling driven by performance characteristics of the remote physical ports. By modeling the remote physical ports within the traffic manager, flows to the physical ports can be controlled to arrive at a rate the physical ports can handle. Any backup that would otherwise occur in the queue at the physical ports is instead queued in the traffic manager. In this manner, the intelligence of the traffic manager can be leveraged to provide improved quality of service with existing infrastructure.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising:

a flow manager;

a remote logical port (RLP) model to model a remote physical port (RPP); and

a trunk scheduler to schedule transmission units direct to the remote physical port.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the flow manager comprises:

a flow shaper; and

a flow parameter database.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the flow manager comprises:

a discard policy that is able to differentiate between the discard rates of at least two flows; and

a flow parameter database.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the flow manager comprises:

an RLP scheduler; and

a flow parameter database.

5. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein the flow manager further comprises:

an RLP scheduler.

6. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the RLP model comprises:

an RLP data structure to hold data indicating characteristics of the RPP; and

an RLP traffic shaper to make a transmission unit eligible consistent with the characteristics of the RPP.

7. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein the flow manager comprises a plurality of queues, one queue for each flow directed toward the RPP.

8. The apparatus of claim 7 wherein shaping and scheduling are performed by manipulating pointers to the queues.

9. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the trunk scheduler statistically multiplexes an aggregate of the flows directed to a plurality of RPPs.

10. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the trunk scheduler operates in a weighted round robin non-work conserving manner.

11. The apparatus of claim 1 further comprising one of an OC-3 port and a DS-3 port.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein the network element comprises:

a first flow shaper to shape a plurality of flows directed to a remote physical port (RPP);

a first scheduler to schedule the flows shaped by the first flow shaper to yield a scheduled flow;

a second flow shaper to shape the scheduled flow; and

a trunk scheduler to schedule the flow shaped by the second flow shaper for transmission to the RPP.

14. The system of claim 12 further comprising:

a plurality of data structures populated with data indicating characteristics of a remote physical port (RPP); and

a database populated with flow parameters.

15. The system of claim 14 wherein a one-to-one correspondence exists between RLP data structures and RPPs.

16. The system of claim 13 wherein the network element comprises:

a queue for each flow directed at a physical port and wherein shaping and scheduling are performed by pointer manipulation.

18. The method of claim 17 wherein reflecting comprises:

shaping a plurality of flows directed to a RPP into a plurality of shaped flows;

scheduling the shaped flow into a scheduled flow;

shaping the scheduled flow into a shaped scheduled flow; and

scheduling the shaped scheduled flow for transmission to the RPP.

19. The method of claim 17 wherein modeling comprises:

populating a database with an entry indicating an ability of an RPP to transmit data.

20. The method of claim 19 wherein modeling further comprises:

creating a data structure for each flow directed to a remote physical port; and

manipulating the data structure to indicate eligibility of a transmission unit consistent with the ability of the RPP to transmit data.

21. The method of claim 17 further comprising:

statistically multiplexing the flows from the plurality of RLPs to the plurality of RPPs.

22. The method of claim 17 wherein a one-to-one correspondence exists between the RLPs and the RPPs.

12. A system comprising:

a broadband communication link;

a demultiplexer coupled to a plurality of physical ports and the broadband communication link; and

a network element coupled to the communication link, the network element modeling the plurality of physical ports and providing a two-tier hierarchy of shaping and scheduling of flows directed to the plurality of physical ports.

17. A method comprising:

modeling a plurality of remote physical ports (RPP) as a plurality of remote logical ports (RLP); and

reflecting quality of service from a control aggregator to the plurality of RPPs.