EVPN host routed bridging (HRB) and EVPN cloud native data center

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12323327-B2
Application number	US-202318538600-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 13, 2023
Priority date	Sep 30, 2021
Publication date	Jun 3, 2025
Grant date	Jun 3, 2025

Abstract

Techniques for EVPN Host Routed Bridging (HRB) and EVPN cloud-native data center with Host Routed Bridging (HRB) are described. A host computing device of a data center includes one or more containerized user-level applications. A cloud native virtual router is configured for dynamic deployment by the data center application orchestration engine and operable in a user space of the host computing device. Processing circuitry is configured for execution of the containerized user-level applications and the cloud native virtual router. The cloud native virtual router comprises a containerized routing protocol process configured to operate as a control plane, and a data plane for the containerized router. The data plane is configured to operate an ethernet virtual private network (EVPN) encapsulation/decapsulation data path of an overlay network for communicating layer two (L2) network traffic of the containerized user applications over a switch fabric of the data center.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A host computing device comprising:
one or more containerized user-level applications configured for dynamic deployment by an orchestration engine;
a cloud native virtual router configured for deployment by the orchestration engine and operable in a user space of the host computing device; and
processing circuitry configured for execution of the one or more containerized user-level applications and the cloud native virtual router;
wherein the cloud native virtual router comprises:
a containerized routing protocol process configured for deployment as one or more containers and configured to operate as a control plane for the cloud native virtual router, and
a data plane for the cloud native virtual router, wherein the data plane is configured to operate an ethernet virtual private network (EVPN) encapsulation/decapsulation data path of an overlay network for communicating layer two (L2) network traffic of a containerized user-level application of the one or more containerized user-level applications, wherein the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path comprises an integrated routing and bridging (IRB) interface providing bridging services for communicating the L2 network traffic of a bridge domain via a virtual routing and forwarding (VRF) structure.

2. The host computing device of claim 1 , further comprising:
a first network interface attached to the cloud native virtual router,
wherein the first network interface is configured to communicate network traffic between the one or more containerized user-level applications executing on the host computing device and one or more containerized user-level applications executing on another computing device.

3. The host computing device of claim 2 , further comprising:
a primary container network interface (CNI) operating as a control channel enabling the orchestration engine to manage the first network interface; and
a secondary CNI operating as a control channel enabling the orchestration engine to manage the cloud native virtual router to configure the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path of the overlay network for communicating L2 network traffic of the containerized user-level application.

4. The host computing device of claim 3 , wherein the secondary CNI is configured to:
receive data specifying a high-level intent for the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path;
translate the data specifying the high-level intent into configuration data; and
based on the configuration data, dynamically configure the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path to provide a network connection between the containerized user-level application and a desired bridge domain for the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path.

5. The host computing device of claim 1 , wherein the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path of the cloud native virtual router is configured as a Host Routed Bridging (HRB) data path comprising:
an L2 VRF table storing media access control (MAC) addresses and L2 forwarding information for one or more L2 networks associated with the one or more containerized user-level applications executing on the host computing device; and
one or more L2 bridge domains (BDs), each of the L2 bridge domains corresponding to a different one of the L2 networks
one or more IRB interfaces that includes the IRB interface, each of the one or more IRB interfaces providing a data plane forwarding path between the layer three (L3) virtual routing and forwarding table and a different one of the one or more L2 bridge domains.

6. The host computing device of claim 1 , further comprising a plurality of pods configured as virtualized elements deployable by the orchestration engine to the host computing device for execution by the processing circuitry of the host computing device,
wherein the plurality of pods comprises:
a first pod comprising the data plane for the cloud native virtual router; and
a different, second pod comprising the containerized routing protocol process.

7. The host computing device of claim 6 , further comprising:
a physical network interface,
wherein the first pod is data plane development kit (DPDK)-enabled and configured that the data plane for the cloud native virtual router can exchange packets with the physical network interface using DPDK.

8. The host computing device of claim 1 , wherein the containerized routing protocol process is configured to execute one or more routing protocols to exchange routing information with routers external to the host computing device.

9. The host computing device of claim 8 ,
wherein the containerized routing protocol process establishes routing protocol adjacencies with a plurality of containerized routers operating within other computing devices, and
wherein the plurality of containerized routers are configured for management by the orchestration engine.

10. The host computing device of claim 9 ,
wherein the one or more routing protocols comprise an interior gateway protocol, and
wherein the routing information comprises underlay routing information for a network, the underlay routing information obtained via the interior gateway protocol.

11. The host computing device of claim 1 , wherein the containerized routing protocol process and the EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path are configured to provide EVPN Type-5 routing of network traffic for the one or more containerized user-level applications.

12. A system comprising:
a plurality of host computing devices;
an orchestrator configured to deploy one or more containerized user-level applications on processing circuitry of the host computing devices;
a plurality of cloud native virtual routers executing on the host computing devices,
wherein at least a containerized routing protocol process of each of the plurality of cloud native virtual routers is configured for deployment by the orchestrator as a containerized user-level application of the one or more containerized user-level applications;
wherein each of the cloud native virtual routers comprises:
the containerized routing protocol process configured to operate as a control plane for the cloud native virtual router, and
a data plane providing a set of layer two (L2) bridging domains connected to a layer three (L3) virtual routing, forwarding (VRF) data structure for an ethernet virtual private network (EVPN) overlay network for communicating layer two (L2) network traffic between the one or more containerized user-level applications, and providing integrated routing and bridging (IRB) services for communicating the L2 network traffic via the VRF structure.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein the data plane is configured to operate an EVPN encapsulation/decapsulation data path configured as a Host Routed Bridging (HRB) data path comprising:
a layer two (L2) VRF table storing media access control (MAC) addresses and L2 forwarding information for one or more L2 networks associated with the one or more containerized user-level applications executing on the host computing device;
one or more L2 bridge domains (BDs), each of the L2 bridge domains corresponding to a different one of the L2 networks; and
one or more IRB interfaces that includes the IRB interface, each of the one or more IRB interfaces providing a data plane forwarding path between the layer three (L3) virtual routing and forwarding table and a different one of the one or more L2 bridge domains.

14. A method comprising:
executing, by a host computing device, a data plane of a cloud native virtual router of the host computing device;
receiving, with a secondary container network interface (CNI) executin

Assignees

• Juniper Networks Inc

Inventors

• Lin Wen
• Gupta Manish
• Channalli Shivakumar
• Nallamothu Vinay K

Classifications

• H04L49/25

  Routing or path finding in a switch fabric · CPC title

• H04L12/4641

  Virtual LANs, VLANs, e.g. virtual private networks [VPN] (LAN interconnection over a bridge based backbone H04L12/462; encapsulation techniques H04L12/4633; routing of packets H04L45/00; packet switches H04L49/00; virtual private networks for security H04L63/0272) · CPC title

• H04L12/4633

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

• H04L45/745 Primary

  Address table lookup; Address filtering · CPC title

• H04L49/00 Primary

  Packet switching elements · CPC title