Nortel Networks Corporation

Cisco Technology, Inc.

Cisco Systems Inc.

Rockstar Consortium US LP

Arthur Lin

Anthony L Alles

Kent Huntley Headrick

Shyam Prasad Pillalamarri

David Mullenex

Thomas James Edsall

Thomas Daly

Suhas Anand Shetty

Tauseef Hashmi

Juha Ilari Heinanen

Prasad Pillalamarri

Kent H Hendrick

Suhas A Shetty

H Kent Hendrick

A Suhas Shetty

An internet service node (ISN) enabling the provision of desired service policies to each subscriber. The desired service policies for each subscriber are provided as an input. The desired service policies are translated into processing rules. Each processing rule contains a classifier and associated action. A classifier generally identifies the application data flows to which the action may be applied to provide the desired service policies. The processing rules may be generated dynamically to implement the specified service policies for each subscriber. Each data bit group may be classified to associate with a subscriber and only the processing rules corresponding to the subscriber may be applied to the data bit group to provide the desired services.

System and method for providing desired service policies to subscribers accessing the internet

A router classifies packets assigned to X*Y classes of service into X classes of service supported by the router, each of the X classes of service having Y loss-priority levels. The router maintains a free queue that links available entries of a buffer in which packets are stored. A weighted average depth of the free queue is used to determine whether to retain a given packet. If the weighted average is above a maximum threshold, the packet is retained. If the weighted average is below a minimum threshold, the packet is discarded. If the weighted average is between the two thresholds, a probability of discard that is based on the X*Y classes of service is calculated and compared to a random value to determine whether the packet should be retained.

Router with class of service mapping

An internet service node (ISN) enabling the provision of desired service policies to each subscriber. The ISN may contain multiple processor groups, with each subscriber being assigned to a processor group. The assigned processor group may be configured with the processing rules, which provide the service policies desired, by a subscriber. A port may determine the specific processor group to which received data is to be forwarded. A content addressable memory with masks for individual locations may be implemented to quickly determines the processor group to which received data is to be assigned to. Due to the features of the present invention, an ISN may be able to serve a large number of subscribers efficiently. The ISN may be used at the edge of an access network.

Providing desired service policies to subscribers accessing internet

A content addressable memory (CAM) having a search field, a mask and an output for each CAM location is used to efficiently determine a processor for processing IP packets, with each IP packet being received as a sequence of cells. IP packets may be assigned to a processor (group) based on an examination of the header data, potentially including IP header and other higher layer protocols headers. The search field of a CAM location is pre-stored with header data, and the bit positions to be searched in the location are specified by using a mask. The output of the location identifies the processor group for executing packets with headers matching the search field, with only the bits specified by the mask being compared. When a first cell of an IP packet is received, the header data is provided as an input to the CAM, and the output identifies the processor (group) for executing the IP packet.

Assigning cell data to one of several processors provided in a data switch

A router includes a classifier that classifies packets assigned to 2 classes of service into 2 classes of service that are supported by the router. The classifier then sets the loss priorities of the respective packets to one of m levels. The router uses a modified weighted random early detection scheme that is based on probabilities of discard associated with the 2 classes of service to determine whether to retain or discard particular packets. The router uses a single buffer to store packets directed to all of the various output ports. The available storage locations in the buffer are linked to a free queue and a weighted average depth of the free queue, is used to determined whether or not to retain a given packet. The router compares the weighted average depth of the free queue to maximum and minimum thresholds associated with the particular 2 class of service to which the packet is assigned. If the weighted average is above the maximum threshold, the packet is retained. If the weighted average is below the minimum threshold, the packet is discarded. If the weighted average is between the two thresholds, a probability of discard that is based on the 2 classes of service is calculated and compared to a random value to determine whether or not the packet should be retained. If the probability of discard exceeds the random value, the packet is discarded. The other packets exit various output ports of the router based on weighting factors associated with the 2 classes of service.

This invention provides an Internet Access Provider (IAP) a simple mechanism to steer users to given Internet services, such as the Web pages, of sponsors. The mechanism allows a sponsor to grant a dial-in user unlimited access to the Internet after the user has first accessed its Internet services. The invention is thus important for any IAP that wants to receive income from sponsors by steering Internet users to their services. In the ultimate case, an IAP could receive all its income from sponsors and thus be able to offer the Internet access for free. The key characteristics of the present invention is that a user is steered to the Internet services of a sponsor based on a sponsor specific called telephone number or a sponsor specific login name.

Steering of internet access to sponsors

A switch in an asynchronous transfer mode system utilizes an early packet discard (EPD) scheme and discards all but the end-of-packet cell of packets that are expected to prevent other partially transmitted packets from being transmitted through the switch. The switch also utilizes an integrated tail packet discard (I-TPD) scheme and, once a cell of a packet has been discarded for any reason, discards all of the remaining cells of the packet except the end-of-packet cell. Each of the EPD and the I-TPD schemes retain the last cell of a packet in order to maintain packet boundaries. Further, they each set the loss-priority of the end-of-packet cell to high, to increase the likelihood that the cell will be transmitted through the remaining switches in the route to the station to which the packet is directed. When the end-of-packet cell is received, the switch retains the cell unless its maximum queue limit is exceeded, and resets any associated early or tail packet discard flag. When the beginning of the next packet is received, the switch checks its queue length against an associated queue limit and against a CLP and an EPD threshold to determine whether or not to retain the cell. If the cell is discarded, the switch invokes, as appropriate, either the EPD or I-TPD and thereafter discards cells of the same packet. It invokes EPD when the queue limit exceeds the EPD threshold, and invokes I-TPD if it discards this or any cell when (a) it is policing a usage or network parameter control violation, (b) its associated queue exceeds an applicable queue limit, or (c) it selectively discards low-priority cells.

Growing community of inventors

San Ramon, CA, United States of America

Arthur Lin