Patent application number | Description | Published |
20130155853 | HIERARCHICAL OCCUPANCY-BASED CONGESTION MANAGEMENT - A system for hierarchical occupancy based congestion management includes a buffer embodied in a computer readable storage medium including a plurality of buffer units for storing packets of a data flow received from sources. The system includes a buffer manager that stores information about the packets stored in the buffer, including a selection criterion associated with each of the plurality of sources and a congestion estimator that monitors a congestion level in the buffer. The system also includes a occupancy sampler that randomly selects at least two occupied buffer units from the plurality of buffer units and identifies the source of the packet stored in each of the occupied buffer units and a congestion notification message generator that generates a congestion notification message; wherein if the congestion level in the buffer exceeds a threshold value the congestion notification message is sent to the identified source with a higher selection criteria. | 06-20-2013 |
20130155857 | HYBRID ARRIVAL-OCCUPANCY BASED CONGESTION MANAGEMENT - A method for hybrid arrival-occupancy based congestion management includes increasing a recent arrivals counter associated with a data flow from one or more sources in response to receiving a data packet from one of the sources and storing the data packet in a buffer including multiple storage units. The method includes determining if a buffer is congested, randomly selecting an occupied unit of the buffer and determining the source of the packet stored in the occupied unit of the buffer, generating a congestion notification message, sending the congestion notification message to the source of the packet stored in the occupied unit of the buffer if the recent arrivals counter exceeds a threshold value and decreasing the recent arrivals counter associated with the source of the packet stored in the occupied unit of the buffer and discarding the congestion notification message if the recent arrivals counter has a zero value. | 06-20-2013 |
20130155858 | HIERARCHICAL OCCUPANCY-BASED CONGESTION MANAGEMENT - A method for hierarchical occupancy based congestion management includes receiving, by a computing device, a plurality of data flows, each of the plurality of data flows is received from a source and includes a plurality of data packets and storing the plurality of data packets in a buffer including multiple storage units. The method includes determining if the buffer is congested, responsive to determining the buffer is congested randomly selecting at least two occupied units of the buffer and identifying a source of each of the data packets stored in the occupied units of the buffer and generating a congestion notification message. The method also includes comparing a selection criterion associated with each identified source to determine which identified source has a higher selection criterion and sending the congestion notification message to the identified source with the higher selection criterion. | 06-20-2013 |
20130163419 | FLEXIBLE AND SCALABLE DATA LINK LAYER FLOW CONTROL FOR NETWORK FABRICS - A network fabric may divide a physical connection into a plurality of VLANs as defined by IEEE 802.1Q. Moreover, many network fabrics use Priority Flow Control to identify and segregate network traffic based on different traffic classes or priorities. Current routing protocols define only eight traffic classes. In contrast, a network fabric may contain thousands of unique VLANs. When network congestion occurs, network devices (e.g., switches, bridges, routers, servers, etc.) can negotiate to pause the network traffic associated with one of the different traffic classes. Pausing the data packets associated with a single traffic class may also stop the data packets associated with thousands of VLANs. The embodiments disclosed herein permit a network fabric to individually pause VLANs rather than entire traffic classes. | 06-27-2013 |
20130163611 | FLEXIBLE AND SCALABLE ENHANCED TRANSMISSION SELECTION METHOD FOR NETWORK FABRICS - IEEE 802.1Q and Enhanced Transmission Selection provide only eight different traffic classes that may be used to control bandwidth in a particular physical connection (or link). Instead of relying only on these eight traffic classes to manage bandwidth, the embodiments discussed herein disclose using an Enhanced Transmission Selection scheduler that permits a network device to set the bandwidth for an individual virtual LAN. Allocating bandwidth in a port based on a virtual LAN ID permits a network device to allocate bandwidth to, e.g., millions of unique virtual LANs. Thus, this technique may increase the granular control of the network fabric and its performance. | 06-27-2013 |
20130166753 | FLEXIBLE AND SCALABLE ENHANCED TRANSMISSION SELECTION METHOD FOR NETWORK FABRICS - IEEE 802.1Q and Enhanced Transmission Selection provide only eight different traffic classes that may be used to control bandwidth in a particular physical connection (or link). Instead of relying only on these eight traffic classes to manage bandwidth, the embodiments discussed herein disclose using an Enhanced Transmission Selection scheduler that permits a network device to set the bandwidth for an individual virtual LAN. Allocating bandwidth in a port based on a virtual LAN ID permits a network device to allocate bandwidth to, e.g., millions of unique virtual LANs. Thus, this technique may increase the granular control of the network fabric and its performance. | 06-27-2013 |
20130166773 | Flexible and scalable data link layer flow control for network fabrics - A network fabric may divide a physical connection into a plurality of VLANs as defined by IEEE 802.1Q. Moreover, many network fabrics use Priority Flow Control to identify and segregate network traffic based on different traffic classes or priorities. Current routing protocols define only eight traffic classes. In contrast, a network fabric may contain thousands of unique VLANs. When network congestion occurs, network devices (e.g., switches, bridges, routers, servers, etc.) can negotiate to pause the network traffic associated with one of the different traffic classes. Pausing the data packets associated with a single traffic class may also stop the data packets associated with thousands of VLANs. The embodiments disclosed herein permit a network fabric to individually pause VLANs rather than entire traffic classes. | 06-27-2013 |
20130258856 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR TRANSMITTING DATA PACKETS IN A NETWORK - A method for transmitting data packets from a first node to a second node. The method includes transmitting the data packet from the first node to the one second node where each data packet is determined to be sent according to a first or a second transmission mode, where, in the first transmission mode, the data packet is transmitted to the second node according to a prescheduled scheme, where the prescheduled scheme defines a cyclic one-to-one assignment between first and second node over time slots so that the data packet is forwarded to the second node during that time slot the one-to-one assignment of which assigns the first node with the one second node and in the second transmission mode, the data packet is transmitted during an actual time slot to the second node while overruling the prescheduled scheme. | 10-03-2013 |
20130322237 | Network congestion notification preservation and modification during transmission of netwrok data between physical network and virtual network - A virtual network is implemented on a physical network. A virtual network data packet is tunneled through the physical network via encapsulation within a physical network data packet and via transmission of the physical network data packet through the physical network. A network congestion notification capability of the virtual network is preserved and modified during transmission of virtual network data through the physical network and vice-versa. Congestion notification metadata can be copied from a header of a virtual network data packet to a header of a physical network data packet when the virtual network data packet is encapsulated into the physical network data packet. Congestion notification metadata can be copied from a header of a physical network data packet to a header of a virtual network data packet when the virtual network data packet is decapsulated from the physical network data packet. | 12-05-2013 |
20130322252 | Network congestion notification preservation and modification during transmission of network data between physical network and virtual network - A virtual network is implemented on a physical network. A virtual network data packet is tunneled through the physical network via encapsulation within a physical network data packet and via transmission of the physical network data packet through the physical network. A network congestion notification capability of the virtual network is preserved and modified during transmission of virtual network data through the physical network and vice-versa. Congestion notification metadata can be copied from a header of a virtual network data packet to a header of a physical network data packet when the virtual network data packet is encapsulated into the physical network data packet. Congestion notification metadata can be copied from a header of a physical network data packet to a header of a virtual network data packet when the virtual network data packet is decapsulated from the physical network data packet. | 12-05-2013 |
20140122771 | WEIGHTAGE-BASED SCHEDULING FOR HIERARCHICAL SWITCHING FABRICS - Techniques are disclosed to implement a scheduling scheme for a crossbar scheduler that provides distributed request-grant-accept arbitration between input group arbiters and output group arbiters in a distributed switch. Input and output ports are grouped and assigned a respective arbiter. The input group arbiters communicate requests indicating a count of respective ports having data packets to be transmitted via one of the output ports. The output group arbiter attempts to accommodate the requests for each member of an input group before proceeding to a next input group. | 05-01-2014 |
20140204748 | ARBITRATION OF MULTIPLE-THOUSANDS OF FLOWS FOR CONVERGENCE ENHANCED ETHERNET - In one embodiment, a system includes a processor and logic integrated with and/or executable by the processor, the logic being adapted to: receive a plurality of flows, each flow comprising packets of data, assign a service credit to each of the plurality of flows, assign a weight parameter to each of the plurality of flows, select a flow from a head of a first control queue unless the first control queue is empty or there is indication that the first control queue should be avoided, wherein a flow is selected from a head of a second control queue when the first control queue is empty or there is indication that the first control queue should be avoided, provide a number of units of service to the selected flow, and decrease the selected flow's service credit by an amount corresponding to the number of units of service provided thereto. | 07-24-2014 |
20140219287 | VIRTUAL SWITCHING BASED FLOW CONTROL - Flow control of data packets in a network may be enabled to at least one side of a virtual switching interface to provide a lossless environment. In some embodiments, wherever two buffer queues are in communication with at least one buffer queue being connected to a virtual switching interface, flow control may be used to determine if a threshold has been exceeded in one of the buffer queues. When exceeded, the transmission of data packets may cease to one of the buffer queues to prevent packet dropping and loss of data. | 08-07-2014 |
20140241345 | SOURCE ROUTING WITH FABRIC SWITCHES IN AN ETHERNET FABRIC NETWORK - In one embodiment, a system includes a network fabric having a plurality of fabric switches interconnected in the network fabric and a switch controller having logic adapted to configure the network fabric, determine one or more paths through the network fabric between any two hosts connected thereto, and create a source-routing table to store the one or more paths through the network fabric between any two hosts connected thereto. In another embodiment, a method includes receiving or creating a packet using a NIC of a host connected to a network fabric having a plurality of fabric switches interconnected therein, determining a path through the network fabric by consulting a source-routing table stored to the host, storing source-routing information to a packet header for the packet, the source-routing information including the path, and sending the packet to a first device or hop indicated by the path in the source-routing information. | 08-28-2014 |
20140245324 | ALL-TO-ALL MESSAGE EXCHANGE IN PARALLEL COMPUTING SYSTEMS - A method for all-to-all message exchange between program tasks including N>1 hierarchy levels l | 08-28-2014 |
20140269325 | BYPASSING CONGESTION POINTS IN A CONVERGED ENHANCED ETHERNET FABRIC - Embodiments relate to bypassing congestion points in a network. An aspect includes sampling queues of a plurality of switches in a network. When packet congestion is detected at a congestion point of a first switch, the packet flow contributing to the packet congestion is identified. A congestion notification message indicating the identified packet flow is then propagated to upstream switches, which are upstream from the first switch in the network. The congestion notification message is then snooped by the upstream switches. Virtual queues within the upstream switches are associated with the identified packet flow to hold packets associated with the identified packet flow. The packets associated with the identified packet flow are then re-routed to bypass the packet congestion in the first switch. | 09-18-2014 |
20140269403 | Coherent Load monitoring of physical and virtual networks with synchronous status acquisition - Embodiments relate to creating a coherent load or congestion map that displays the simultaneous activity of all queues of physical and virtual switches and adapters in a network without forcing clock synchronization. An aspect includes sampling, by a central processing device, a status of all queues in a plurality of elements in a network. The sampled data flows are received from the plurality of elements in the network and an image is created of the network. The image includes the status of all sampled queues in the plurality of elements at a point in time. Accordingly, a load map is created without synchronizing clocks of the plurality of elements. The load map is assembled using segments of the image of the network. | 09-18-2014 |
20140269705 | HETEROGENEOUS OVERLAY NETWORK TRANSLATION FOR DOMAIN UNIFICATION - In one embodiment, a method for providing multi-protocol overlay handling includes receiving first traffic via an input overlay tunnel at a multi-protocol virtual tunnel end point (VTEP)-enabled device, the first traffic including a plurality of overlay-encapsulated packets which adhere to a first overlay network protocol, and wherein the input overlay tunnel adheres to the first overlay network protocol; routing the first traffic to a second overlay network tunnel which adheres to a second overlay network protocol when a destination of the first traffic is specified as the second overlay network tunnel, the second overlay network tunnel being terminated at the multi-protocol VTEP-enabled device; and bridging the first traffic to a destination overlay network tunnel terminated at the multi-protocol VTEP-enabled device when the destination of the first traffic is specified as the destination overlay network tunnel, the destination overlay network tunnel being terminated at the multi-protocol VTEP-enabled device. | 09-18-2014 |
20140281020 | SOURCE-DRIVEN SWITCH PROBING WITH FEEDBACK REQUEST - Embodiments relate to proactively probing the packet queues of elements in a physical or virtual network to predict and prevent the occurrence of congestion points. An aspect includes receiving a first feedback request at a central controller connected to a plurality of switches in a network. The first feedback request includes a request to periodically probe a status of queues of switches in the network. A second feedback request is then transmitted to one or all the switches in a path leading to a designated destination. Responses to the second feedback request are received at the central controller from a designated proxy switch, which aggregated the responses into a single data packet. Accordingly, the responses extracted from the single data packet at the central controller are used to preventing future congestion points. | 09-18-2014 |
20140281021 | ADAPTIVE SETTING OF THE QUANTIZED CONGESTION NOTIFICATION EQUILIBRIUM SETPOINT IN CONVERGED ENHANCED EITHERNET NETWORKS - Embodiments relate to controlling workload flow on converged Ethernet links. An aspect includes coupling, by a processing device, a first control loop to a second control loop. The second control loop monitors the operation of the first control loop. An equilibrium set point is initialized for the second control loop prior to commencing operation of the first control loop. Accordingly, the equilibrium set point value is adjusted in the second control loop continuously based on a rate of operation of the first control loop. | 09-18-2014 |
20140301187 | CREDIT-BASED LINK LEVEL FLOW CONTROL AND CREDIT EXCHANGE USING DCBX - In one embodiment, a system includes a network having one or more devices interconnected therebetween, the network including a first device having a first port and logic integrated with and/or executable by a first processor, the logic being adapted to exchange credit exchange (CE) capabilities between the first port and a second port of a second device in the network, receive a credit grant packet from the second port, the credit grant packet indicating credits granted to the first port, and send one or more packets of data from the first port to the second port, the one or more packets corresponding with the granted credits. Other systems and methods for providing credit-based flow control are described according to more embodiments. | 10-09-2014 |
20140307554 | VIRTUAL ENHANCED TRANSMISSION SELECTION (VETS) FOR LOSSLESS ETHERNET - In one embodiment, a system includes a hardware processor and logic integrated with and/or executable by the processor, the logic being adapted to receive a traffic flow having a plurality of packets, classify the traffic flow into a traffic class based on a characteristic of the traffic flow, the traffic class being selected from a plurality of traffic classes, store an identifier of the selected traffic class to one or more of the packets, and transmit the traffic flow according to its destination based on a priority of its selected traffic class. In more embodiments, additional systems, methods, and computer program products for prioritizing traffic flow handling are described. | 10-16-2014 |
20140307555 | FLOW CONTROL CREDITS FOR PRIORITY IN LOSSLESS ETHERNET - In one embodiment, a system includes an initiator port adapted to receive a traffic flow having a plurality of packets and a hardware processor and logic integrated with and/or executable by the processor, the logic being adapted to classify the traffic flow into a traffic class based on at least one criteria related to the traffic flow, the traffic class being selected from a plurality of traffic classes and transmit one or more packets of the traffic flow to a target port designated by the one or more packets of the traffic flow until an amount of flow credits allocated to the target port is insufficient to service additional packets. Other systems, methods, and computer program products for providing credit-based flow control are described in more embodiments. | 10-16-2014 |
20140328340 | VIRTUAL DATA CENTER BRIDGING EXCHANGE (VDCBX) PROTOCOL - In one embodiment, a system includes processor; and logic integrated with and/or executable by the processor, the logic being adapted to: assign a VLAN type to each of a plurality of VLANs of an architecture; generate a VLAN list type-length-value (vTLV) message; and transmit information to resources based at least in part on the vTLV message, wherein the resources comprise at least one virtual switch and one or more of: at least one physical switch; at least one virtual port; at least one physical port; at least one virtual machine; at least one converged network adapter (CNA); and at least one fibre channel forwarder (FCF). | 11-06-2014 |
20150016252 | SOURCE-DRIVEN SWITCH PROBING WITH FEEDBACK REQUEST - Embodiments relate to proactively probing the packet queues of elements in a physical or virtual network to predict and prevent the occurrence of congestion points. An aspect includes receiving a first feedback request at a central controller connected to a plurality of switches in a network. The first feedback request includes a request to periodically probe a status of queues of switches in the network. A second feedback request is then transmitted to one or all the switches in a path leading to a designated destination. Responses to the second feedback request are received at the central controller from a designated proxy switch, which aggregated the responses into a single data packet. Accordingly, the responses extracted from the single data packet at the central controller are used to preventing future congestion points. | 01-15-2015 |
20150019752 | ADAPTIVE SETTING OF THE QUANTIZED CONGESTION NOTIFICATION EQUILIBRIUM SETPOINT IN CONVERGED ENHANCED EITHERNET NETWORKS - Embodiments relate to controlling workload flow on converged Ethernet links. An aspect includes coupling, by a processing device, a first control loop to a second control loop. The second control loop monitors the operation of the first control loop. An equilibrium set point is initialized for the second control loop prior to commencing operation of the first control loop. Accordingly, the equilibrium set point value is adjusted in the second control loop continuously based on a rate of operation of the first control loop. | 01-15-2015 |
20150078170 | BYPASSING CONGESTION POINTS IN A CONVERGED ENHANCED ETHERNET FABRIC - Embodiments relate to bypassing congestion points in a network. An aspect includes sampling queues of a plurality of switches in a network. When packet congestion is detected at a congestion point of a first switch, the packet flow contributing to the packet congestion is identified. A congestion notification message indicating the identified packet flow is then propagated to upstream switches, which are upstream from the first switch in the network. The congestion notification message is then snooped by the upstream switches. Virtual queues within the upstream switches are associated with the identified packet flow to hold packets associated with the identified packet flow. The packets associated with the identified packet flow are then re-routed to bypass the packet congestion in the first switch. | 03-19-2015 |