Combined hardware/software forwarding mechanism and method

• US 8,848,715 B2
• Filed: 03/01/2011
• Issued: 09/30/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/16/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Marvell Israel Limited (Marvell Technology Group Limited)
• Original Assignee: Marvell Israel Limited (Marvell Technology Group Limited)
• Inventors: Izenberg, Erez, Pais, Alon, Torok, Ruven, Melts, Dimitry, Caduri, Yuval, Epshtein, Dmitri
• Primary Examiner(s): Phillips, Hassan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Wei, Siren
• Application Number:
  US13/037,459
• Publication Number:
  US 20110228781A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,309 Days
• Field of Search: 370/392, 370/401
• US Class Current: 370/392
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/30 Routing of multiclass traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/60 Router architectures
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2441 relying on flow classification, e.g. using integrated services [IntServ]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2483 involving identification of individual flows
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/33 using forward notification
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/22 Parsing or analysis of headers

Abstract

A forwarding system comprises a identification engine, a hardware forwarding engine configured to process an ingressing packet, a software forwarding engine configured to process the ingressing packet, and a selection engine. The selection engine is configured to select one of the hardware forwarding engine or the software forwarding engine to process the ingressing packet. The selection is based on at least one of an indication of resource availability or a classification of the ingressing packet based on a priority of a flow as determined by the identification engine. In some embodiments, the selection engine selects different forwarding engines to process different packets of a same flow based on changes in resource availability or classification of the ingressing packet.

Claims

1. A method of utilizing hardware forwarding and software forwarding of network traffic in a forwarding system, comprising:

receiving a plurality of packets at one of a plurality of ports of a forwarding system having (i) a software forwarding engine, the software forwarding engine being implemented using a processor executing machine readable instructions, and (ii) a hardware forwarding engine,

wherein the forwarding system is configured to process a given packet using only one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine;

classifying the given packet based on a priority of a flow to which the given packet belongs;

selecting, at a selection engine of the forwarding system, one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine to determine an egress port via which the given packet is to be transmitted from the forwarding system, the selection engine being in communicative connection with the software forwarding engine and with the hardware forwarding engine, the selecting based on;

(i) an availability of one or more resources, including at least one of;

a rate of packets in the flow corresponding to the given packet, a size of a TCAM (Ternary Content Addressable Memory) of the hardware forwarding engine, a number of available entries in the TCAM, a number of allocated queues or buffers, or a number of entries in a queue or buffer;

(ii) the classification of the given packet, and

(iii) a type of an application corresponding to the given packet or a requirement of the application; and

processing and forwarding, by the forwarding system, the given packet using only the selected one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine and without using the unselected one of the software forwarding engine and the hardware forwarding engine.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein classifying the given packet comprises determining at least one of the type of application corresponding to the given packet or the requirement of the application corresponding to the given packet;

and

wherein the priority of the flow corresponds to the at least one of the type of the application or the requirement of the application.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the flow is a network traffic flow of related packets including the given packet, and the method further comprises:

obtaining an indication of a change in the availability of the one or more resources;

re-selecting the software forwarding engine implemented by the processor executing the machine readable instructions or the hardware forwarding engine based on the change; and

forwarding a subsequent packet included in the network traffic flow using the re-selected forwarding engine.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein classifying the given packet comprises determining a type of the given packet, and wherein selecting the one of the hardware forwarding engine or the software forwarding engine implemented by the processor executing the machine readable instructions is further based on the type of the given packet.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the flow is a first flow, and wherein the method further comprises:

classifying a packet of a second flow based at least in part on a priority of the second flow;

re-selecting, by the selection engine, the one of the hardware forwarding engine or the software forwarding engine implemented by the processor executing the machine readable instructions based on the classification of the packet of the second flow; and

forwarding the packet of the second flow using the re-selected forwarding engine.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the method is performed by one of a home gateway or a small business gateway.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising parsing the given packet to determine parsed information, and wherein classifying the given packet comprises classifying the given packet further based at least partially on the parsed information.

7. A forwarding system, comprising:

a hardware forwarding engine configured to process an ingressing packet;

a software forwarding engine implemented using a processor executing machine readable instructions and configured to process the ingressing packet;

an identification engine configured to determine a classification of the ingressing packet based on a priority of a respective flow to which the ingressing packet corresponds; and

a selection engine configured to select one of the hardware forwarding engine or the software forwarding engine implemented using the processor executing the machine readable instructions to process and forward the ingressing packet including determining an egress port via which the ingressing packet is to be transmitted from the forwarding system, the selection based on;

(i) an indication of an availability of resources, comprising an indication of at least one of;

a rate of packets in the flow corresponding to the ingressing packet, a size of a TCAM (Ternary Content Addressable Memory) of the hardware forwarding engine, a number of available entries in the TCAM, a number of allocated queues or buffers, or a number of entries in a queue or buffer;

(ii) the classification of the ingressing packet determined by the identification engine, and

(iii) a type of an application corresponding to the ingressing packet or a requirement of the application;

wherein the forwarding system is configured to process and forward each received packet by (i) using only a respective one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine selected by the selection engine, and (ii) not using the respective other one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine.

8. The forwarding system of claim 7, further comprising a transmit engine coupled to each of the hardware forwarding engine and the software forwarding engine implemented using the processor executing the machine readable instructions, and configured to egress the ingressing packet from the forwarding system.

9. The forwarding system of claim 7, wherein:

the forwarding system further comprises a resource indicator configured to generate an indication of a change in at least one resource; and

the selection engine is further configured to re-select the one of the hardware forwarding engine or the software forwarding engine implemented using the processor executing the machine readable instructions based on the indication of the change in the at least one resource and to cause a subsequent ingressing packet of the respective flow to be forwarded to the re-selected forwarding engine.

10. The forwarding system of claim 9, wherein the indication of the change in the at least one resource comprises an indication of a change in an availability of the at least one resource.

11. The forwarding system of claim 10, wherein the indication of the change in the availability of the at least one resource comprises an indication of a selectable amount of change in the availability of the at least one resource.

12. The forwarding system of claim 7, wherein the forwarding system is one of a home gateway or a small business gateway.

19. The forwarding system of claim 7, wherein the identification engine is further configured to parse the ingressing packet to determine parsed information, and the classification of the ingressing packet is determined based at least partially on the parsed information.

13. A forwarding system, comprising:

a processor and a memory;

a software forwarding engine comprising machine readable instructions stored on the memory, executable by the processor, and configured to process a packet for forwarding;

a hardware forwarding engine configured to process the packet for forwarding;

a parser and classifier engine configured to classify the packet based on a priority of a flow to which a packet corresponds; and

a selection engine configured to determine a selection of one of;

the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine for processing the packet for forwarding including determining an egress port via which the packet is to be transmitted from the forwarding system, the selection based on;

(i) an indication of resource availability, comprising an indication of at least one of;

a rate of packets in the flow corresponding to the packet, a size of a TCAM (Ternary Content Addressable Memory) of the hardware forwarding engine, a number of available entries in the TCAM, a number of allocated queues or buffers, or a number of entries in a queue or buffer;

(ii) the classification of the packet, and

(iii) a type of an application corresponding to the packet or a requirement of the application;

wherein;

the forwarding system is configured to process each received packet by (i) using only a respective one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine included in a respective selection determined by the selection engine, and (ii) not using the respective other one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine.

14. The forwarding system of claim 13, wherein the machine readable instructions are first machine readable instructions, the packet is a first packet corresponding to the flow, and the forwarding system further comprises at least one of:

second further machine readable instructions to;

obtain an indication of a change in the resource availability,

re-select the one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine based on the indication of the change in resource availability, and

cause a second packet corresponding to the flow to be forwarded using the re-selected forwarding engine;

or

third further machine readable instructions to;

obtain an indication of a type of the first packet,

select the one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine further based on the type of the first packet,

cause the first packet to be forwarded using the selected forwarding engine,

obtain an indication of a type of the second packet,

re-select the one of the software forwarding engine or the hardware forwarding engine based on the type of the second packet, and

cause the second packet to be forwarded using the re-selected forwarding engine.

15. The forwarding system of claim 13, wherein

the forwarding system is one of a home gateway or a small business gateway.

16. The forwarding system of claim 13, wherein the selection engine comprises additional machine readable instructions stored on the memory and executable by the processor.

17. The forwarding system of claim 13, wherein the parser and classifier engine is further configured to parse the packet to determine parsed information, and the classification of the packet is determined based at least partially on the parsed information.