Data center network having optical permutors

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11632606-B2
Application number	US-202117301842-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 15, 2021
Priority date	Mar 29, 2017
Publication date	Apr 18, 2023
Grant date	Apr 18, 2023

Abstract

A network system for a data center is described in which a switch fabric may provide full mesh interconnectivity such that any servers may communicate packet data to any other of the servers using any of a number of parallel data paths. Moreover, according to the techniques described herein, edge-positioned access nodes, optical permutation devices and core switches of the switch fabric may be configured and arranged in a way such that the parallel data paths provide single L2/L3 hop, full mesh interconnections between any pairwise combination of the access nodes, even in massive data centers having tens of thousands of servers. The plurality of optical permutation devices permute communications across the optical ports based on wavelength so as to provide, in some cases, full-mesh optical connectivity between edge-facing ports and core-facing ports.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
receiving, from each of a plurality of access nodes and by a system having a plurality of optical input ports and a plurality of optical output ports, a plurality of optical signals over each of the plurality of optical input ports, wherein each optical signal includes a plurality of wavelengths, and wherein each of the access nodes are coupled between the system and at least one of a plurality of servers within a network;
splitting, by a first optical device within the system, the plurality of wavelengths in a first subset of the optical signals;
splitting, by a second optical device within the system, the plurality of wavelengths in a second subset of the optical signals;
communicating, by the first optical device, the plurality of wavelengths carried by the first subset of the optical signals to the plurality of optical output ports and communicating, by the second optical device, the plurality of wavelengths carried by the second subset of the optical signals so that each of the optical output ports carry a unique permutation of the optical input ports and the plurality of wavelengths; and
forwarding, by the system from the optical output ports and over at least one of a plurality of core switches within the network, the unique permutations to a destination server.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein communicating the plurality of wavelengths includes:
communicating the plurality of wavelengths carried by each of the optical signals to the plurality of optical output ports so that no single optical output port carries multiple optical communications having the same wavelength.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the access nodes, the plurality of core switches, and the system are configured to provide full mesh connectivity between any pairwise combination of the plurality of servers.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of servers includes a source server, and wherein the source server and the destination server are remotely located from each other,
wherein the plurality of access nodes includes a first access node coupled to the source server, and wherein a second access node is coupled to the destination server; and
wherein, when communicating a packet flow of packets between the source server and the destination server, the first access node sprays the packets of the packet flow across a plurality of data paths to the second access node, wherein each of the plurality of data paths extends across at least one of the plurality of core switches leading to the destination server.

5. The method of claim 4 ,
wherein the second access node reorders the packets into an original sequence of the packet flow and delivers the reordered packets to the destination server.

6. A network system comprising:
a plurality of servers;
a switch fabric comprising a plurality of core switches;
a plurality of access nodes, each of the access nodes coupled to a subset of the servers to communicate data packets between the servers; and
an optical permutation device having a plurality of optical input ports and a plurality of optical output ports, wherein the optical permutation device couples the access nodes to the core switches by optical links, wherein the optical permutation device is configured to:
receive, from each of the plurality of access nodes, a plurality of optical signals over each of the plurality of optical input ports from the plurality of access nodes, wherein each optical signal received includes a plurality of wavelengths,
split, by a first optical device within the optical permutation device, the plurality of wavelengths in a first subset of the optical signals,
split, by a second optical device within the optical permutation device, the plurality of wavelengths in a second subset of the optical signals,
communicate, by the first optical device, the plurality of wavelengths carried by the first subset of the optical signals to the plurality of optical output ports and communicate, by the second optical device, the plurality of wavelengths carried by the second subset of the optical signals so that each of the optical output ports carry a unique permutation of the optical input ports and the plurality of wavelengths, and
forward, over at least one of the plurality of core switches within the switch fabric, the unique permutations to a destination server.

7. The network system of claim 6 , wherein to communicate the plurality of wavelengths, the optical permutation device is further configured to:
communicate the plurality of wavelengths carried by each of the optical signals to the plurality of optical output ports so that no single optical output port carries multiple optical communications having the same wavelength.

8. The network system of claim 6 , wherein the access nodes, the plurality of core switches, and the optical permutation device are configured to provide full mesh connectivity between any pairwise combination of the plurality of servers.

9. The network system of claim 6 , wherein the plurality of servers includes a source server, and wherein the source server and the destination server are remotely located from each other,
wherein the plurality of access nodes includes a first access node coupled to a source server, and wherein a second access node is coupled to a destination server; and
wherein, when communicating a packet flow of packets between the source server and the destination server, the first access node sprays the packets of the packet flow across a plurality of data paths to the second access node, wherein each of the plurality of data paths extends across at least one of the plurality of core switches.

10. The network system of claim 9 , wherein the second access node is configured to:
reorder the packets into an original sequence of the packet flow and deliver the reordered packets to the destination server.

11. The network system of claim 6 ,
wherein the access nodes, the plurality of core switches, and the optical permutation device are configured to connect any pairwise combination of the access nodes by at most a single layer three (L3) hop.

12. A system having a storage system and processing circuitry, wherein the processing circuitry has access to the storage system and is configured to:
receive, from each of a plurality of access nodes, a plurality of optical signals over each of a plurality of optical input ports, wherein each optical signal includes a plurality of wavelengths, and wherein each of the access nodes are coupled between the system and at least one of a plurality of servers within a network;
split, by a first optical device within the system, the plurality of wavelengths in a first subset of the optical signals;
split, by a second optical device within the system, the plurality of wavelengths in a second subset of the optical signals,
communicate, by the first optical device, the plurality of wavelengths carried by the first subset of the optical signals to a plurality of optical output ports and communicate, by the second optical device, the plurality of wavelengths carried by the second subset of the optical signals so that the optical output ports carry a unique permutation of the optical input ports and the plurality of wavelengths; and
forward, from the optical output ports and over at least one of a plurality of core switches within the network, the unique permutations to a destination server.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein to communicate the plurality of wavelengths, the processing circuitry is further configured to:
communicate the plurality of wavelengths carried by each of the optical signals to the plur

Assignees

• Fungible Inc

Inventors

• Sindhu Pradeep
• Deo Satish D
• Goel Deepak
• Mekad Sunil

Classifications

• H04L49/113

  Arrangements for redundant switching, e.g. using parallel planes · CPC title

• H04L49/112

  Switch control, e.g. arbitration · CPC title

• H04L49/111

  Switch interfaces, e.g. port details · CPC title

• H04Q11/0005 Primary

  Switch and router aspects · CPC title

• H04Q11/0067 Primary

  Provisions for optical access or distribution networks, e.g. Gigabit Ethernet Passive Optical Network (GE-PON), ATM-based Passive Optical Network (A-PON), PON-Ring · CPC title