Vmware, Inc.

Nicira, Inc.

Akhila Naveen

Raju Koganty

Jayant Jain

Pierluigi Rolando

Rahul Mishra

Kantesh Mundaragi

Fenil Kavathia

Yong Feng

Stephen Tan

Chidambareswaran Raman

Anuprem Chalvadi

Yang Ping

Yuxiao Zhang

Sami Boutros

Hua Wang

Xin Wang

Donghai Han

Jianjun Shen

Yusheng Wang

Li Sun

Yanjun Lin

Mani Kancherla

Abhishek Mishra

Srinivas Ramaswamy

Sumedh Saurav

Krishna Chaitanya Bandi

Elton Furtado

Jayakrishnan Chathu

Subramanyam Manuguri

Hui Zheng

An example method of packet processing in a host cluster of a virtualized computing system includes: receiving traffic at packet processing software of a hypervisor executing on a host of the host cluster; processing the traffic using a network service of the packet processing software in the hypervisor; redirecting the traffic to a service virtual machine (VM) in the host cluster through a virtual network interface card (vNIC) of the service VM; sending metadata from the network service of the packet processing software to the service VM; processing the traffic and the metadata through at least one network service executing in the service VM; returning the traffic from the service VM to the packet processing software of the hypervisor; and forwarding, by the packet processing software, the traffic to a destination.

Deploying network security services in a virtualized computing system

Some embodiments provide novel methods for performing services for machines operating in one or more datacenters. For instance, for a group of related guest machines (e.g., a group of tenant machines), some embodiments define two different forwarding planes: (I) a guest forwarding plane and (2) a service forwarding plane. The guest forwarding plane connects to the machines in the group and performs L2 and/or L3 forwarding for these machines. The service forwarding plane (1) connects to the service nodes that perform services on data messages sent to and from these machines, and (2) forwards these data messages to the service nodes. In some embodiments, the guest machines do not connect directly with the service forwarding plane.

Providing services with guest VM mobility

Some embodiments provide a method for configuring a gateway machine in a datacenter. The method receives a definition of a logical network for implementation in the datacenter. The logical network includes at least one logical switch to which logical network endpoints attach and a logical router for handling data traffic between the logical network endpoints in the datacenter and an external network. The method receives configuration data attaching a third-party service to at least one interface of the logical router via an additional logical switch designated for service attachments. The third-party service is for performing non-forwarding processing on the data traffic between the logical network endpoints and the external network. The method configures the gateway machine in the datacenter to implement the logical router and redirect at least a subset of the data traffic between the logical network endpoints and the external network to the attached third-party service.

Service insertion at logical network gateway

In an embodiment, a method for a VRF and multi-service insertion on edge gateways is described. In an embodiment, the method comprises obtaining a rule configuration. Based on, at least in part, the rule configuration, a rule table is created. The rule table comprises rule data records, wherein a rule data record comprises packet attributes and a redirection identifier. A policy configuration comprising policy records is obtained. Each policy record comprises a redirection identifier, a next_hop, and an address pair for interfaces. A mapping between VRF identifiers and address pairs is generated. Based on, at least in part, the mapping and the policy configuration, a policy table is generated. The policy table comprises table records, wherein a table record comprises a redirection identifier, a next_hop, and an address pair. The rule and policy tables are used to redirect a packet from an edge gateway to a service virtual machine.

Multi-VRF and multi-service insertion on edge gateway virtual machines

Some embodiments provide a method for detecting a failure of a layer 2 (L2) bump-in-the-wire service at a device. In some embodiments, the device sends heartbeat signals to a second device connected to L2 service nodes in order to detect failure of the L2 service (e.g., a failure of all the service nodes). In some embodiments, the heartbeat signals are unidirectional heartbeat signals (e.g., a unidirectional bidirectional-forwarding-detection (BFD) session) sent from each device to the other. The heartbeat signals, in some embodiments, use a broadcast MAC address in order to reach the current active L2 service node in the case of a failover (i.e., an active service node failing and a standby service node becoming the new active service node). The unidirectional heartbeat signals are also used, in some embodiments, to decrease the time between a failover and data messages being forwarded to the new active service node.

Detecting failure of layer 2 service using broadcast messages

Some embodiments provide novel methods for providing a set of services for a logical network associated with an edge forwarding element acting between a logical network and an external network. In some embodiments, the services are provided using a logical service forwarding plane that connects the edge forwarding element to a set of service nodes that each provide a service in the set of services. The service classification operation of some embodiments identifies a chain of multiple service operations that has to be performed on the data message. In some embodiments, identifying the chain of service operations includes selecting a service path to provide the multiple services. After selecting the service path, the data message is sent along the selected service path to have the services provided. The data message is returned to the edge forwarding element by a last service node in the service path that performs the last service operation and the edge forwarding element performs next hop forwarding on the data message.

Using service planes to perform services at the edge of a network

Some embodiments provide novel methods for providing different types of services for a logical network associated with an edge forwarding element acting between the logical network and an external network. The edge forwarding element receives data messages for forwarding and performs a service classification operation to select a set of services of a particular type for the data message. The particular type of service is one of multiple types of services that use different transport mechanisms to forward the data to a set of service nodes (e.g., service virtual machines, or service appliances, etc.) that provide the service. The edge forwarding element receives the data message after the selected set of services has been performed and performs a forwarding operation to forward the data message. In some embodiments, the method is also performed by edge forwarding elements that are at the edges of logical network segments within the logical network.

Using multiple transport mechanisms to provide services at the edge of a network

Some embodiments provide novel methods for performing services for machines operating in one or more datacenters. For instance, for a group of related guest machines (e.g., a group of tenant machines), some embodiments define two different forwarding planes: (1) a guest forwarding plane and (2) a service forwarding plane. The guest forwarding plane connects to the machines in the group and performs L2 and/or L3 forwarding for these machines. The service forwarding plane (1) connects to the service nodes that perform services on data messages sent to and from these machines, and (2) forwards these data messages to the service nodes. In some embodiments, the guest machines do not connect directly with the service forwarding plane. For instance, in some embodiments, each forwarding plane connects to a machine or service node through a port that receives data messages from, or supplies data messages to, the machine or service node. In such embodiments, the service forwarding plane does not have a port that directly receives data messages from, or supplies data messages to, any guest machine. Instead, in some such embodiments, data associated with a guest machine is routed to a port proxy module executing on the same host computer, and this other module has a service plane port. This port proxy module in some embodiments indirectly can connect more than one guest machine on the same host to the service plane (i.e., can serve as the port proxy module for more than one guest machine on the same host).

Service path generation in load balanced manner

Configuring distributed forwarding for performing service chain operations

Some embodiments facilitate the provision of a service reachable at a virtual internet protocol (VIP) address. The VIP address is used by clients to access a set of service nodes in the logical network. Facilitating the provision of the service, in some embodiments, includes returning a serviced data message to a load balancer that selected a service node to provide the service for the load balancer to track the state of the connection using the service logical forwarding element. To use the service logical forwarding element, some embodiments configure an egress datapath of the service nodes to intercept the serviced data message before being forwarded to a logical forwarding element in the datapath from the client to the service node, and determine if the serviced data message requires routing by the routing service provided as a service by the edge forwarding element.

Using router as service node through logical service plane

Creating and distributing service chain descriptions

Specifying service chains

For traffic exiting a logical network through a particular VTI, some embodiments perform a service classification operation for different data messages to identify different VTIs that connect the edge forwarding element to a service node to provide services required by the data messages. Each data message, in some embodiments, is then forwarded to the identified VTI to receive the required service. The identified VTI does not perform a service classification operation. The service node then returns the serviced data message to the edge forwarding element. In some embodiments, the identified VTI is not configured to perform the service classification operation and is instead configured to mark all traffic directed to the edge forwarding element as having been serviced. The marked serviced data message is received at the edge forwarding element and forwarded to a destination of the data message through the particular VTI.

Providing services at the edge of a network using selected virtual tunnel interfaces

Providing services by using multiple service planes

Growing community of inventors

Palo Alto, CA, United States of America

Akhila Naveen