Interconnect flow control

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9794183-B2
Application number	US-201514871321-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 30, 2015
Priority date	Jun 25, 2013
Publication date	Oct 17, 2017
Grant date	Oct 17, 2017

Abstract

A communication technique which includes determining, at least in part by comparing data associated with a packet that has been pulled from a received packet queue with a highest sequence number among packets that have been placed in the received packet queue, that the received packet queue has space available to receive a further packet. A receiver with which the received packet queue is associated is sent, based at least in part on the determination, a next packet.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of communicating, comprising:
determining, at least in part by comparing data associated with a packet that has been pulled from a received packet queue with a highest sequence number among packets that have been placed in the received packet queue, that the received packet queue has space available to receive a further packet; and
sending based at least in part on the determination, to a receiver with which the received packet queue is associated, a next packet;
wherein the data associated with the packet that has been pulled from the received packet queue is received by a sender of the packet in an acknowledgement sent by a receiver of the packet, the data associated with the packet including a sequence number of the packet, and wherein the sender is configured to compare the sequence number of the packet with said highest sequence number to make said determination that the received packet queue has space available to receive said further packet.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determination is made at a sender from which the next packet is sent.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising waiting to send a subsequent packet based at least in part on the determination that the received packet queue is full.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determination is made based at least in part on data sent by a master receiver thread that pulled the packet from the received packet queue.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the packet is placed in the received packet queue by a background receiver thread configured to receive packets sent via a network interconnect and place them in the received packet queue.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the master receiver thread receives the highest sequence number from the background receiver thread.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the master receiver thread includes the highest sequence number in an acknowledgement message sent to acknowledge receipt of the packet.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determination is made at a sender of the packet in response to an acknowledgement (ack) message received at the sender.

9. A system for communicating, comprising:
a processor; and
a memory coupled with the processor, wherein the memory is configured to provide the processor with instructions which when executed cause the processor to:
determine, at least in part by comparing data associated with a packet that has been pulled from a received packet queue with a highest sequence number among packets that have been placed in the received packet queue, that the received packet queue has space available to receive a further packet; and
send based at least in part on the determination, to a receiver with which the received packet queue is associated, a next packet;

wherein the data associated with the packet that has been pulled from the received packet queue is received by a sender of the packet in an acknowledgement sent by a receiver of the packet, the data associated with the packet including a sequence number of the packet, and wherein the sender is configured to compare the sequence number of the packet with said highest sequence number to make said determination that the received packet queue has space available to receive said further packet.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein the determination is made at a sender from which the next packet is sent.

11. The system of claim 9 , wherein the instructions further cause the processor to wait to send a subsequent packet based at least in part on the determination that the received packet queue is full.

12. The system of claim 9 , wherein the determination is made based at least in part on data sent by a master receiver thread that pulled the packet from the received packet queue.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein the packet is placed in the received packet queue by a background receiver thread configured to receive packets sent via a network interconnect and place them in the received packet queue.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the master receiver thread receives the highest sequence number from the background receiver thread.

15. The system of claim 14 , wherein the master receiver thread includes the highest sequence number in an acknowledgement message sent to acknowledge receipt of the packet.

16. The system of claim 9 , wherein the determination is made at a sender of the packet in response to an acknowledgement (ack) message received at the sender.

17. A computer program product for communicating, the computer program product being embodied in a non-transitory computer readable storage medium and comprising computer instructions for:
determining, at least in part by comparing data associated with a packet that has been pulled from a received packet queue with a highest sequence number among packets that have been placed in the received packet queue, that the received packet queue has space available to receive a further packet; and
sending based at least in part on the determination, to a receiver with which the received packet queue is associated, a next packet;
wherein the data associated with the packet that has been pulled from the received packet queue is received by a sender of the packet in an acknowledgement sent by a receiver of the packet, the data associated with the packet including a sequence number of the packet, and wherein the sender is configured to compare the sequence number of the packet with said highest sequence number to make said determination that the received packet queue has space available to receive said further packet.

18. The computer program product of claim 17 , wherein the determination is made based at least in part on data sent by a master receiver thread that pulled the packet from the received packet queue.

19. The computer program product of claim 18 , wherein the packet is placed in the received packet queue by a background receiver thread configured to receive packets sent via a network interconnect and place them in the received packet queue.

20. The computer program product of claim 19 , wherein the master receiver thread receives the highest sequence number from the background receiver thread.

Assignees

• Emc Corp
• Emc Ip Holding Co Llc

Inventors

• Chang Lei
• Ma Tao
• Jian Lirong
• Harriman Kurt
• Wang Zhanwei
• Ma Lili

Classifications

• H04L47/30 Primary

  in combination with information about buffer occupancy at either end or at transit nodes · CPC title

• H04L49/90 Primary

  Buffering arrangements · CPC title

• H04L47/27

  Evaluation or update of window size, e.g. using information derived from acknowledged [ACK] packets · CPC title

• H04L43/022

  by sampling · CPC title

• H04L47/6255

  queue load conditions, e.g. longest queue first · CPC title