Cisco Technology, Inc.

Ashish K Dey

Jianxin Wang

Pradeep Patel

Jonathan Augustine Kunder

Andrew E Ossipov

A first packet of a packet flow is received at a classifying network device. The first packet is forwarded from the classifying network device to a firewall network device. An indication that the packet flow is to be offloaded is received at the classifying network device. Data is stored at the classifying network device indicating that the packet flow is to be offloaded. A non-control packet of the packet flow is received at the classifying network device. A determination is made that the non-control packet belongs to the packet flow by comparing data contained in the non-control packet to the stored data. The non-control packet of the packet flow is directed to a processing entity in response to the determining. A control packet of the packet flow is received at the classifying network device. The control packet of the packet flow is directed to the firewall network device.

Selective offloading of packet flows with flow state management

In one example, a service function forwarder of a service function chain enabled domain receives, from a classifier of the service function chain enabled domain, network traffic assigned to a service function path that includes at least one service node configured to apply a service function to the network traffic. The service function forwarder forwards the network traffic along the service function path. The service function forwarder receives, from the at least one service node, instructions for dynamically assigning a particular service function path to predicted network traffic that the at least one service node predicts will be triggered by the network traffic. The service function forwarder forwards the instructions to the classifier.

Service function chain dynamic classification

The invention relates to a method and apparatus for rapidly re-starting a spanning tree process at an intermediate device. A spanning tree entity running one or more instances of a spanning tree process or protocol stores a record of spanning tree parameter information and port states in a non-volatile memory. Following a re-start, the spanning tree entity verifies whether the parameter information in the non-volatile memory is still valid. If so, the spanning tree entity adopts the port states and the intermediate device resumes forwarding messages accordingly. If the spanning tree parameter information from the non-volatile memory is no longer valid, the spanning tree entity discards it and proceeds to re-calculate the spanning tree and transition its port states in a conventional manner.

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Sunnyvale, CA, United States of America

Ashish K Dey