One embodiment of the present invention provides a switch. The switch includes a port that couples to a server hosting a number of virtual machines. The switch also includes a set of virtual port grouping information and a virtual port grouping mechanism. During operation, the virtual port grouping mechanism determines whether a frame is traveling from a virtual port group to the same virtual port group. If the frame is not traveling to the same virtual port group, the virtual port grouping mechanism prevents the frame from being forwarded.

Virtual port grouping for virtual cluster switching

One embodiment of the present invention provides a switch. The switch includes a tunnel management module, a packet processor, and a forwarding module. The tunnel management module operates the switch as a tunnel gateway capable of terminating an overlay tunnel. During operation, the packet processor, which is coupled to the tunnel management module, identifies in a data packet a virtual Internet Protocol (IP) address associated with a virtual tunnel gateway. This virtual tunnel gateway is associated with the switch and the data packet is associated with the overlay tunnel. The forwarding module determines an output port for an inner packet in the data packet based on a destination address of the inner packet.

Overlay tunnel in a fabric switch

One embodiment of the present invention provides a switch system. The switch includes a port profile which specifies a set of port configuration information. During operation, a control mechanism within the switch detects a source MAC address of an incoming frame and determines that the MAC address is associated with the port profile. The control mechanism then applies the port profile to a switch port on which the frame is received.

Port profile management for virtual cluster switching

One embodiment of the present invention provides a switch capable of processing software-defined data flows. The switch includes an identifier management module and a flow definition management module. During operation, the identifier management module allocates a logical identifier to a link aggregation port group which includes a plurality of ports associated with different links. The flow definition management module processes a flow definition corresponding to the logical identifier, applies the flow definition to ports in the link aggregation port group, and update lookup information for the link aggregation port group based on the flow definition.

Link aggregation in software-defined networks

A switch that facilitates remote port mirroring is described. The switch can include an encapsulation mechanism and a forwarding mechanism. The encapsulation mechanism can be configured to encapsulate a copy of a first packet in a second packet, thereby preserving header information (e.g., a VLAN identifier and/or a TRILL header) of the first packet. The forwarding mechanism can be configured to forward the first packet using header information of the first packet, and forward the second packet using header information of the second packet. The second packet can be received at a destination switch which extracts the first packet from the second packet, and sends the first packet on a port which is coupled to a network analyzer.

Remote port mirroring

A method and system for static routing in a TRILL network is disclosed. Routing bridges in the TRILL network use LLDP discovery to identify their next hop routing bridges. A data packet, with an inner header specifying a MAC address of a destination host, is sent by a source host and received by an ingress routing bridge. The ingress routing bridge encapsulates the data packet with a TRILL header and an outer header and sends the data packet to a next hop routing bridge on path to the destination host. The next hop routing bridge determines it is not the egress routing bridge for the data packet and sends the data packet onward to the egress routing bridge. The egress routing bridge decapsulates the data packet and forwards the data packet to the destination host specified in the inner header.

Method and system for static trill routing

In one embodiment, a method for providing virtual link aggregation (vLAG) in a transparent interconnection of lots of links (TRILL)-enabled network, includes creating a virtual routing bridge logically connected to a first physical routing bridge and a second physical routing bridge to form a vLAG group at an edge of the TRILL-enabled network; determining a first distribution tree linking the first physical routing bridge to every other routing bridge in the TRILL-enabled network in a non-repeating fashion, ending with the second physical routing bridge; determining a second distribution tree linking the second physical routing bridge to every other routing bridge in the TRILL-enabled network in a non-repeating fashion, ending with the first physical routing bridge; receiving a multicast packet at the virtual routing bridge from one of the physical routing bridges; and distributing the multicast packet according to either the first or the second distribution tree thereby preventing looping.

Virtual link aggregation extension (vlag+) enabled in a trill-based fabric network

A networking system, and more particularly an interface management subsystem, offers logical interface abstraction for networking system software. The networking system generally transmits data via a hardware interface. All software components in the control and forwarding plane use a Logical Interface (LIF) that is a logical representation of the hardware interface. A mapping occurs between the LIF and hardware interface used to transmit the data. Each LIF is represented by an LIF identifier used to store and retrieve logical interface records to and from shared memory accessible to all protocols and applications in the control and forwarding plane. The efficient storage and retrieval of such logical interface records allows for a global unique view of network interfaces, avoidance of data replication in each networking system software application's memory space, etc.

Logical interface encoding

A tool for packet transmission and delivery in a distributed system. The tool determines a first level packet classification for one or more packets in the distributed system. The tool determines a second level packet classification for the one or more packets in the distributed system. The tool registers one or more applications included within one or more logical switch routers in the distributed system with a software module to filter the one or more packets in the distributed system.

Packet i/o support for a logical switch router architecture

A tool for assigning virtual port channels to one or more logical switch routers in a distributed system. The tool receives, by one or more computer processors, a request to assign a virtual port channel to a second logical switch router. The tool sends, by one or more computer processors, a request to negotiate a link-down on the channel on a first logical switch router to a universal fiber port on the first logical switch router for processing. The tool sends, by one or more computer processors, a request to create the channel on the second logical switch router to a second interface manager on the second logical switch router for processing. The tool sends, by one or more computer processors, a request to negotiate a link up on the channel on the second logical switch router to the universal fiber port on the first logical switch router for processing.

Daljeet Singh

Papers

Method and system for static trill routing

Virtual link aggregation extension (vlag+) enabled in a trill-based fabric network

Logical interface encoding

Packet i/o support for a logical switch router architecture

Virtual port support in a logical switch architecture