NSH encapsulation for traffic steering

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11240065-B2
Application number	US-202017020787-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 14, 2020
Priority date	Apr 20, 2018
Publication date	Feb 1, 2022
Grant date	Feb 1, 2022

Abstract

A method for establishing a tunnel between VTEPs includes receiving at an SDN controller a tunnel creation request to establish a VxLAN tunnel from a first VTEP to a second VTEP, determining a VxLAN tunnel of network nodes coupling the first VTEP to the second VTEP, assigning a SvcPI to the VxLAN tunnel, and sending a tunnel initiation command to the first VTEP, the tunnel initiation command causing the first VTEP to convert an Ethernet frame to a path-ID frame by adding an NSH encapsulation header and to forward the path-ID frame to the next network node in the VxLAN tunnel.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus associated with a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), comprising a processor and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium having processor-executable instructions stored thereon, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, cause the apparatus to carry out the steps of:
receiving a first frame, where the first frame is an Ethernet frame;
sending a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the apparatus and a second VxLAN tunnel end point (VTEP), where the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; and

wherein the second frame comprises a VxLAN header comprising a network service header (NSH) shim; wherein the NSH shim comprises a VxLAN network identifier (VNI), and the VNI comprises more than 24-bits.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NSH shim comprises the SvcPI.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NSH shim further comprises a network service header (NSH) metadata, and the NSH metadata comprises the VNI.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 , where the SvcPI is assigned by a controller to the VxLAN tunnel.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 , where second frame further comprises an Internet Protocol (IP) address of the network node.

6. A method comprising:
receiving a first frame, by a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), where the first frame is an Ethernet frame; and
sending, by the first VTEP, a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the first VTEP and a second VTEP, where the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; wherein the second frame comprises a VxLAN header comprising a network service header (NSH) shim, wherein the NSH shim comprises a VxLAN network identifier (VNI) and the VNI comprises more than 24-bits.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the NSH shim comprises the SvcPI.

8. The method of claim 6 , wherein the NSH shim further comprises a network service header (NSH) metadata, and the NSH metadata comprises the VNI.

9. The system of claim 6 , where the SvcPI is assigned by a controller to the VxLAN tunnel.

10. The system of claim 6 , where second frame further comprises an Internet Protocol (IP) address of the network node.

11. A system comprising:
a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), and
a second VTEP;

where the first VTEP is configured to
 receive a first frame, where the first frame is an Ethernet frame;
 send a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the first VTEP and a second VTEP, where the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; and
wherein the second frame comprises a VxLAN header comprising a network service header (NSH) shim, where the NSH shim further comprising a VxLAN network identifier (VNI); wherein the VNI comprises more than 24-bits.

12. The system of claim 11 , wherein the NSH shim comprises the SvcPI.

13. The system of claim 11 , wherein the NSH shim further comprises a network service header (NSH) metadata, and the NSH metadata comprises the VNI.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of:
receiving a first frame, by a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), where the first frame is an Ethernet frame;
sending, by the first VTEP, a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the first VTEP and a second VTEP, where the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; and
wherein the second frame comprises a VxLAN header comprising a network service header (NSH) shim, wherein the NSH shim comprises a VxLAN network identifier (VNI) and the VNI comprises more than 24-bits.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein, the NSH shim comprises the SvcPI.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein the NSH shim further comprises a network service header (NSH) metadata, and the NSH metadata comprises the VNI.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , where the SvcPI is assigned by a controller to the VxLAN tunnel.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , where second frame further comprises an Internet Protocol (IP) address of the network node.

19. An apparatus associated with a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), comprising a processor and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium having processor-executable instructions stored thereon, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processor, cause the apparatus to carry out the steps of:
receiving a first frame, where the first frame is an Ethernet frame;
sending a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the apparatus and a second VxLAN tunnel end point (VTEP), where the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; and
wherein the SvcPI is between an outer user datagram protocol (UDP) header and a VxLAN network identifier (VNI).

20. A method comprising:
receiving a first frame, by a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), where the first frame is an Ethernet frame;
sending, by the first VTEP, a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the first VTEP and a second VTEP, where the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; and
wherein the SvcPI is between an outer user datagram protocol (UDP) header and a VxLAN network identifier (VNI).

21. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of:
receiving a first frame, by a first virtual extensible local area network (VxLAN) tunnel end point (VTEP), where the first frame is an Ethernet frame;
sending, by the first VTEP, a second frame to a network node, where the network node is comprised in a VxLAN tunnel between the first VTEP and a second VTEP, wherein the second frame comprises a service path identifier (SvcPI) associated with the VxLAN tunnel; and
wherein the SvcPI is between an outer user datagram protocol (UDP) header and a VxLAN network identifier (VNI).

Assignees

• Futurewei Technologies Inc

Inventors

• Guichard James N
• Lee Young

Classifications

• H04L12/4645

  Details on frame tagging (routing of packets H04L45/00; support for virtual LAN H04L49/354) · CPC title

• H04L12/4604

  LAN interconnection over a backbone network, e.g. Internet, Frame Relay · CPC title

• H04L12/4633 Primary

  Interconnection of networks using encapsulation techniques, e.g. tunneling · CPC title