Method for accelerating generation of VXLAN packet with hardware, method for accelerating removal of VXLAN header with hardware, and method for accelerating modification to VXLAN packet with hardware

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12574265-B2
Application number	US-202318387484-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 7, 2023
Priority date	Nov 11, 2022
Publication date	Mar 10, 2026
Grant date	Mar 10, 2026

Abstract

A method for accelerating the generation of Virtual Extensible Local Area Network (VXLAN) packets with an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) includes the following steps: determining whether an original packet is an upstream packet; when the original packet is the upstream packet, determining whether the original packet is for a VXLAN egress interface; when the original packet is for the VXLAN egress interface, adding a prototype outer header to the front of the original packet and thereby generating a VXLAN packet; and after generating the VXLAN packet, determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method for accelerating generation of Virtual Extensible Local Area Network (VXLAN) packets with hardware, the method comprising:
determining whether an original packet is an upstream packet; when the original packet is the upstream packet, determining whether the original packet is for a VXLAN egress interface; when the original packet is for the VXLAN egress interface, adding a prototype outer header to a front of the original packet and thereby generating a VXLAN packet; and after generating the VXLAN packet, determining whether to modify content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet, wherein the prototype outer header includes K field(s) and includes M fields, and the M is an integer greater than one, in which the K is a positive integer greater than one and smaller than the M; the K fields include a Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) field, an Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) field or an Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) field, and a User Datagram Protocol (UDP) field; the method includes a decision step to determine whether to modify content of the K field(s); and the decision step includes: determining whether a PPPoE length offset of the PPPoE field is zero, and updating content of the PPPoE field when the PPPoE length offset is not zero; determining whether an IPv4/IPv6offset of the IPv4/IPv6 field is zero, and updating content of the IPv4/IPv6 field when the IPv4/IPv6 offset is not zero; determining whether a UDP length offset of the UDP field is zero, and updating content of the UDP field when the UDP length offset is not zero; and determining whether a UDP sport (UDP source port) offset of the UDP field is zero, and updating content of the UDP field when the UDP sport offset is not zero.

2 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising: when the prototype outer header is not stored in a content buffer of a content table of the hardware, acquiring at least a part of the content of the prototype outer header from an upper circuit and storing the prototype outer header in the content buffer.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the content buffer is devoted to the VXLAN egress interface.

4 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the upper circuit executes software and/or firmware to generate the at least a part of the content of the prototype outer header.

5 . The method of claim 4 , wherein the hardware is an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), the upper circuit includes a central processing unit (CPU), and both the hardware and the upper circuit are included in a network switch or a network router.

6 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the step of determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet includes: acquiring multiple field values from the upper circuit, and storing the multiple field values in multiple fields of a control entry of a control table respectively; and determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet according to the control entry.

7 . The method of claim 6 , wherein the control entry is devoted to the VXLAN egress interface.

8 . The method of claim 6 , wherein the upper circuit executes software and/or firmware to generate the multiple field values.

9 . The method of claim 6 , the step of determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet according to the control entry includes: checking the content of the K field(s) of the prototype outer header according to the multiple field values of the multiple fields of the control entry and thereby determining whether to modify the content of the K field(s), wherein the K is a positive integer smaller than the M.

10 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising: when the prototype outer header is stored in a content buffer of a content table of the hardware, acquiring the prototype outer header from the content buffer.

11 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the step of determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet includes: determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet according to a control entry of a control table of the hardware, wherein the control entry includes multiple field values.

12 . The method of claim 11 , wherein the prototype outer header includes M fields, and the M is an integer greater than one; and the step of determining whether to modify the content of the prototype outer header of the VXLAN packet according to the control entry of the control table includes: checking the content of the K field(s) of the prototype outer header according to the multiple field values and thereby determining whether to modify the content of the K field(s), wherein the K is a positive integer smaller than the M.

Assignees

• Realtek Semiconductor Corp

Inventors

• Su Tsung-Yin
• Chen Ji

Classifications

• H04L12/10

  Current supply arrangements · CPC title

• H04L45/74 Primary

  Address processing for routing · 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

• H04L12/4683 Primary

  characterized by the protocol used · CPC title