At&t Intellectual Property I, LP

Huajin Jeng

Han Q Nguyen

Pravin Kumar Johri

Samir S Saad

Penn L Pfautz

Douglas M Nortz

James Uttaro

Tuan Duong

Thomas Spencer, Iv

Kang Xi

Adrian Cepleanu

Methods, apparatus and articles of manufacture for advertising network layer reachability information specifying a quality of service for an identified network flow are disclosed. Example methods disclosed herein to specify quality of service for network flows include receiving network layer reachability information including a first quality of service class specified for a first network flow, the network layer reachability information having been advertised by a first network element that is to receive the first network flow. Such example methods can also include updating an incoming packet determined to belong to the first network flow to indicate that the incoming packet belongs to the first quality of service class, the incoming packet being received from a second network element. Such example methods can further include, after updating the incoming packet, routing the incoming packet towards the first network element.

Advertising network layer reachability information specifying a quality of service for an identified network flow

Methods, apparatus and articles of manufacture for advertising network layer reachability information specifying a quality of service for a network flow are disclosed. Example network devices disclosed herein construct a packet filter based on a flow specification and a first quality of service advertised by a destination device for a first network flow, the packet filter to associate a default quality of service with a first incoming packet not associated with any of one or more advertised network flows represented in the packet filter. Disclosed example network devices also set, based on the packet filter, one or more bits of a second incoming packet that belongs to the first network flow to a value representative of the first quality of service. Disclosed example network devices further cause the second incoming packet to be routed towards the destination device based on the first quality of service.

Methods, apparatus, and articles of manufacture to provide a multicast virtual private network (MVPN) are disclosed. Example methods to transmit multicast data in a network disclosed herein include monitoring, with a first network node, a multicast data flow to determine a characteristic for triggering a switch from a first logical topology for the multicast data flow to a second logical topology for the multicast data flow. Disclosed example methods also include, after the switch to the second logical topology, accessing a multicast data packet associated with a first multicast route generated for the multicast data flow from a second network node, and transmitting a first replication of the multicast data packet to a third network node via a unicast path, the first replication of the multicast data packet to include a first label provided by the third network node to identify the first multicast route.

Methods, apparatus, and articles of manufacture to provide a multicast virtual private network (MVPN)

A content distribution network includes first and second controllers, and multicast enabled routers. The first controller is configured to select a multicast channel for distributing content, to determine that the content has a geographic restriction associated with a restricted area in the content distribution network, to link an exclusion policy for the content to the multicast channel while the multicast channel provides the content, and to deny a request for the content from a client system within the restricted area based on the exclusion policy. The second controller is configured to distribute the exclusion policy to the multicast enabled routers including a first router configured to store the exclusion policy, and to ignore a multicast join message from the client system within the restricted area based on the exclusion policy.

System and method for controlling multicast geographic distribution

Methods, apparatus and articles of manufacture for advertising network layer reachability information specifying a quality of service for a network flow are disclosed. An example first network device disclosed herein is to advertise a first flow specification and a first quality of service for a first network flow to be received by the first network device, and access a second flow specification and a second quality of service advertised by a second network device for a second network flow that is to be received by the second network device. The example first network device is also to update bits of an incoming packet that belongs to the second network flow to determine an updated incoming packet, and assign the updated incoming packet to a routing queue corresponding to the second quality of service to cause the updated incoming packet to be routed towards the second network device.

A router may include a central processing unit-based line card storing a forwarding table that includes a first set of entries, a network processing unit-based line card storing a partial forwarding table that includes a second set of entries comprising a subset of the first set of entries, where the second set of entries comprises entries that are most utilized by a plurality of line cards of the router, and a route controller for updating the second set of entries to comprise the entries that are the most utilized. The network processing unit-based line card may forward a packet when an entry in the partial forwarding table matches the packet and may forward the packet to the central processing unit-based line card to forward the packet when there is no entry in the partial forwarding table of the network processing-unit based line card that matches the packet.

Routers with network processing unit and central processing unit-based line cards

Methods, apparatus, and articles of manufacture to provide a multicast virtual private network (MVPN) are disclosed. An example method to transmit multicast data over a communication network includes receiving, at a first machine, a multicast data packet from an ingress provider edge router of the communication network, the multicast data packet associated with a multicast route, and transmitting a first replication of the multicast data packet from the first machine to a second machine via a first unicast path. The first replication of the multicast data packet includes a first label provided by the second machine to identify the multicast route in the second machine. Example methods further include receiving the first replication of the multicast data packet at the second machine via the first unicast path, and replicating the multicast data packet from the second machine to an egress provider edge router of the communication network.

Methods, apparatus and articles of manufacture for advertising network layer reachability information specifying a quality of service for a network flow are disclosed. Example methods disclosed herein include advertising a first flow specification and a first quality of service for a first network flow to be received by a first network element, and constructing a packet filter for a second network flow based on a second flow specification and a second quality of service advertised by a second network element that is to receive the second network flow. Disclosed example methods also include adjusting, based on the packet filter, bits of an incoming packet determined to belong to the second network flow to determine an updated incoming packet, and assigning the updated incoming packet to a routing queue corresponding to the second quality of service to cause the updated incoming packet to be routed towards the second network element.

Example methods disclosed herein include registering a first leaf node to receive multicast data from a source via a first network node in response to receiving, from the first leaf node, a first message addressed to an anycast address, the anycast addressed being assigned to the first network node to associate the first network node with a second hierarchical level of a replication hierarchy. The disclosed example methods also include receiving the multicast data from a second network node associated with a first hierarchical level of the replication hierarchy. The disclosed example methods further include, after registering the first leaf node with the first network node, replicating the multicast data to generate copies of the multicast data to be transmitted via respective unicast paths to respective ones of a plurality of leaf nodes, including the first leaf node, registered with the first network node to receive the multicast data.

Methods and apparatus for network multicasting using hierarchical replication

Methods, apparatus, and articles of manufacture to provide a multicast virtual private network (MVPN) are disclosed. An example method to transmit multicast data over a communication network includes: determining an upstream hop of a multicast transmission based on a received hierarchical ingress replication route; storing a downstream hop and the upstream hop of the multicast transmission in a multicast routing table; monitoring the multicast transmission occurring via an area border router; in response to detecting at least one of a) a threshold fan-out of the multicast transmission or b) a threshold data rate from a source of the multicast transmission, converting a logical topology of the multicast transmission; and in response to receiving a multicast data packet of the multicast transmission, replicating the multicast data packet with the processor based on the downstream hop.

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Middletown, NJ, United States of America

Huajin Jeng