Connecting to multiple cloud instances in a telecommunications network

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10742447-B2
Application number	US-201816031985-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 10, 2018
Priority date	Jul 10, 2017
Publication date	Aug 11, 2020
Grant date	Aug 11, 2020

Abstract

Aspects of the disclosure involve systems and methods for utilizing Virtual Local Area Network separation in a connection, which may be a single connection, between a customer to a telecommunications network and a cloud environment to allow the customer to access multiple instances within the cloud through the connection. A customer may purchase multiple cloud resource instances from a public cloud environment and, utilizing the telecommunications network, connect to the multiple instances through a communication port or connection to the cloud environment. To utilize the single connection or port, communication packets intended for the cloud environment may be tagged with a VLAN tag that indicates to which cloud instance the packet is intended. The telecommunications network may route the packet to the intended cloud environment and configure one or more aspects of the cloud environment to analyze the attached VLAN tag to transmit the packet to the intended instance.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method comprising:
receiving, at a first edge device of a first network, a first plurality of communication packets from a single port of a first customer device, the first plurality of communication packets associated with a first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and associated with a first customer;
receiving, at the first edge device and from the single port, a second plurality of communication packets, the second plurality of communication packets associated with a second Virtual Local Area Network identifier and associated with the first customer, wherein the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier is associated with a first cloud computing instance in a cloud computing environment and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier is associated with a second cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment, and wherein the first customer is authorized to access both the first cloud computing instance and the second cloud computing instance using the first customer device;
routing, to a cloud edge device of the cloud computing environment, the first plurality of communication packets associated with the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier for connection to the first cloud computing instance and the second plurality of communication packets associated with the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier for connection to the second cloud computing instance; and
providing the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier to one or more application programming interfaces of the cloud computing environment to establish routing of packets associated with the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier to the first cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment and to distinctly route packets associated with the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier to the second cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising establishing a connection between the first customer device and the first edge device by receiving, from the single port at the first customer device, a UNI port identifier that is for the single port, the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier, and Layer 2 and Layer 3 transport information.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first cloud computing instance and the second cloud computing instance comprise a first virtual private cloud and a second virtual private cloud, respectively, and wherein the first virtual private cloud and the second virtual private cloud are segmented environments within the cloud computing environment establishing a first virtual gateway and a second virtual gateway between the first edge device and the cloud computing environment based on the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier, respectively.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier are provided in headers of the respective first plurality of communication packets and the second plurality of communication packets from the single port to establish a multiplexed connection between a network of the first device to a second network of the cloud edge device comprising at least the first cloud computing instance and the second cloud computing instance of the cloud computing environment.

5. The method of claim 1 , the method further comprising:
establishing a communication path between multiple networks and the cloud computing environment by:
connecting one or more networks to the single port of the first customer device by a Link Aggregation Group connection to an egress port connected to the first edge device of the cloud computing environment in accordance with the communication path; and
wherein the single port receives or transmits packets from multiple networks that include the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier of packet streams from the first device.

6. A system comprising:
a first edge device of a first network including one or more processors and a communication interface coupled to the one or more processors, wherein the first edge device provides communication between a cloud computing environment and a single port of a first customer device, and wherein the one or more processors are configured to perform operations comprising:
receiving, from the single port, a first plurality of communication packets from the first customer device, the first plurality of communication packets associated with a first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and associated with a first customer;
receiving, from the single port, a second plurality of communication packets from the first customer device, the second plurality of communication packets associated with a second Virtual Local Area Network identifier and associated with the first customer, wherein the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier is associated with a first cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier is associated with a second cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment, and wherein the first customer is authorized to access both the first cloud computing instance and the second cloud computing instance using the first customer device;
routing, to a cloud edge device of the cloud computing environment, the first plurality of communication packets associated with the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier for connection to the first cloud computing instance and the second plurality of communication packets associated with the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier for connection to the second cloud computing instance; and
providing the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier to one or more application programming interfaces of the cloud computing environment to configure at least the cloud edge device of the cloud computing environment to route packets associated with the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier to the first cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment and to distinctly route packets associated with the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier to the second cloud computing instance in the cloud computing environment.

7. The system of claim 6 , the one or more processors further configured to perform operations comprising:
establishing a connection between the first customer device and the first edge device by receiving, from the single port at the first customer device, a UNI port identifier associated with the single port, the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier, and Layer 2 and Layer 3 transport information.

8. The system of claim 6 , wherein the first cloud computing instance and the second cloud computing instance comprise a first virtual private cloud and a second virtual private cloud, respectively, and wherein the first virtual private cloud and the second virtual private cloud are segmented environments within the cloud computing environment establishing a first virtual gateway and a second virtual gateway between the first customer device and the cloud computing environment based on the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier, respectively.

9. The system of claim 6 , wherein the first Virtual Local Area Network identifier and the second Virtual Local Area Network identifier are provided in headers of the respective first plurality of commu

Assignees

• Level 3 Communications Llc

Inventors

• Ritchie Austin D

Classifications

• H04L41/0895

  Configuration of virtualised networks or elements, e.g. virtualised network function or OpenFlow elements · CPC title

• H04L12/4675 Primary

  Dynamic sharing of VLAN information amongst network nodes (configuration of the network or of network elements H04L41/08) · CPC title

• H04L49/354 Primary

  for supporting virtual local area networks [VLAN] · CPC title

• H04L41/0803

  Configuration setting · CPC title

• H04L41/0893

  Assignment of logical groups to network elements · CPC title