Networking device configuration value persistence

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10924347-B1
Application number	US-201916655180-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Oct 16, 2019
Priority date	Oct 16, 2019
Publication date	Feb 16, 2021
Grant date	Feb 16, 2021

Abstract

Configuration value persistence management (CVPM) tools and techniques provide faster persistence of networking device configuration values than classic approaches. CVPM consolidates configuration dump events based on certain dump conditions. Configuration value changes are journaled, and running configuration values are dumped to a data store only when the dump conditions are satisfied, instead of dumping all of the running configuration values whenever any of them is changed. Both the persistence of configurations and the restoration of persisted configurations are described. Configuration dump conditions may utilize device availability indicators, device load calculations, configuration change load calculations, dump age, or journal size, for example, or combinations thereof, with various thresholds. Thresholds may be hard, soft, or probabilistic. A wide variety of kinds of configuration values for many different kinds of networking devices may be efficiently and safely persisted and restored using CVPM in various computing environments.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A networking profile configuration value persistence management system, comprising:
a configuration dump store including digital storage;
a configuration change journal including additional digital storage; and
a configuration value persistence management processor in operable communication with the configuration change journal and the configuration dump store, the configuration value persistence management processor configured to perform configuration value persistence management steps which include (a) receiving a configuration change request specifying one or more configuration values of a networking profile which facilitates management of network communications, (b) journaling the received configuration change request by appending it to the configuration change journal, (c) submitting the received configuration change request for application to at least one networking device, (d) determining that a configuration dump condition is satisfied after one or more instances of said receiving, journaling, and submitting, and (e) in response to determining that the configuration dump condition is satisfied, dumping current configuration values of the at least one networking device and clearing the configuration change journal;
whereby the networking profile configuration value persistence management system persists configuration change requests associated with networking profiles, and does so with a lower computational overhead than would be incurred by dumping all of the configuration values without journaling any of them.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the configuration change request specifies at least one of the following configuration values:
a routing table entry;
a firewall rule;
a virtual private network endpoint;
an encryption protocol;
a network communication protocol;
a security credential;
a list of one or more allowed domains or endpoints;
a list of one or more disallowed domains or endpoints; or
a service level agreement policy.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein the configuration dump condition specifies at least one of the following:
a maintenance mode indicator for a networking device transition into a maintenance mode;
a reboot indicator for a networking device reboot;
a software reload indicator for a networking device software reload;
a database reload indicator for a networking device database reload; or
a replacement indicator for a networking device replacement.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the configuration dump condition specifies at least one of the following:
a CPU load threshold for comparison to a predicted CPU load;
a database transaction threshold for comparison to a predicted database transaction count;
a user count threshold for comparison to a user count;
a session count threshold for comparison to a session count; or
a process count threshold for comparison to a process count.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein the configuration dump condition specifies at least one of the following:
a configuration change request rate threshold for comparison to a configuration change request rate;
a configuration dump age threshold for comparison to a configuration dump age; or
a configuration change journal size threshold for comparison to a configuration change journal size.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the configuration value persistence management processor is further configured to perform configuration value persistence management steps which include:
reading from the configuration dump store one or more dumped configuration values;
applying the dumped configuration values to the networking device;
reading from the configuration change journal one or more journaled configuration values; and
after the dumped configuration values are applied, applying the journaled configuration values to the networking device.

7. A method of managing persistence of configuration values of a networking device, comprising:
receiving a configuration change request specifying one or more configuration values;
journaling the received configuration change request by appending it to a configuration change journal;
submitting the received configuration change request for application to at least one networking device;
determining that a configuration dump condition is satisfied after one or more instances of said receiving, journaling, and submitting; and
in response to determining that the configuration dump condition is satisfied, dumping current configuration values of the at least one networking device and clearing the configuration change journal.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein dumping current configuration values of a particular networking device comprises:
disallowing any application of configuration changes to the particular networking device;
writing to a configuration dump store at least one configuration value of the particular networking device; and then
allowing a configuration change to be applied to the particular networking device.

9. The method of claim 7 , wherein the configuration change request specifies one or more configuration values by specifying at least one of the following:
a configuration value that identifies a network node M that is one hop away from a network node N;
a configuration value that specifies a network node M is reachable from a network node N;
a configuration value that identifies a network subnet;
a configuration value that identifies a trust domain;
a configuration value that identifies a protocol for use by a network node M in communicating with a network node N;
a configuration value that identifies a particular cloud tenant; or
a configuration value that identifies a particular customer.

10. The method of claim 7 , further comprising:
reading from the configuration dump store a collection D of dumped configuration values;
applying each of the collection D dumped configuration values to at least one networking device, whereby the collection D is applied to multiple networking devices;
reading from the configuration change journal a collection J of journaled configuration values;
applying each of the collection J journaled configuration values to at least one networking device, whereby the collection J is applied to multiple networking devices; and
wherein for each of the networking devices, applying dumped configuration values, if any, precedes applying journaled configuration values, if any.

11. The method of claim 10 , further comprising inhibiting traffic processing by a networking device M until after the journaled configuration values are applied, by doing at least one of the following:
dropping traffic that is directed at the networking device M;
diverting traffic that was directed at the networking device M by directing that traffic instead at a networking device N; or
buffering traffic that is received at the networking device M and delaying or avoiding content processing within the networking device M of any buffered traffic, wherein content processing includes one or more of: forwarding buffered traffic to another networking device N based on address content of the buffered traffic, or providing payload content of the buffered traffic to an application program running on the networking device M.

12. The method of claim 7 , wherein:
the method is performed within a cloud;
the method further comprises noting a resource change action by an owner of a networking profile, wherein the resource change action includes creating, deleting, or modifying a resource in the cloud; and
the configuration change request is triggered by the resource change action.

13. The method of claim 7 , w

Assignees

• Microsoft Technology Licensing Llc

Inventors

• Narsian Anish Sagar
• Gonzalez Prieto Alberto

Classifications

• H04L67/30

  Profiles · CPC title

• H04L41/0859 Primary

  by keeping history of different configuration generations or by rolling back to previous configuration versions · CPC title

• G06F11/1471 Primary

  involving logging of persistent data for recovery · CPC title

• H04L67/10

  in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network (software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46) · CPC title

• H04L41/0856

  by backing up or archiving configuration information · CPC title