Arista Networks, Inc.

Ericsson Ab

Redback Networks Inc.

James Chun Pang

Lawrence Ong

David R Stiles

Siegfried Luft

Kevin Martin Amiraux

Travis Ryan Hammond

Bidong Chen

Peter Lam

Ning He

James Walter Shephard

Graeme Jeffrey Rennie

Vijayaraghavan Rangarajan

Techniques for leveraging Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE) to carry monitored network traffic (i.e., network packets that are received and matched to a monitoring policy by a network monitoring system/fabric) are provided. In one set of embodiments, these techniques involve encapsulating a monitored packet using GRE by inserting the monitored packet in an unmodified form into a payload portion of a GRE packet and inserting metadata regarding the monitored packet into a header portion of the GRE packet, where the header portion employs a non-standard GRE header format that is designed to accommodate such metadata.

Using generic routing encapsulation (GRE) for carrying monitored network traffic

In general, embodiments relate to a method, obtaining, by a monitoring fabric network device operating in the monitoring fabric, a packet, wherein the packet is a replication of a packet sent to a second network device, applying a classification to the packet, performing, using the classification, a modification on a layer 2 (L2) address of the packet to obtain a modified packet, wherein the modified packet includes a modified L2 address, and transmitting the modified packet to a second monitoring fabric network device based on forwarding policies, wherein the forwarding policies do not utilize the modified L2 address.

Media access control address rewrite using egress header editing in traffic aggregation mode

In some embodiments, a method processes a first packet and generates a first copy of the first packet as a second packet. The method sends second copies of the first packet to a first group of multiple destinations defined by a first address. Also, the method sends the second packet to an interface with a loopback function. The interface recirculates the second packet for further processing. The second packet is processed where the second packet is assigned a destination of a second address. Then, the method sends copies of the second packet to a second group of multiple destinations defined by the second address.

Mirroring to multiple destinations using a monitoring function

Some embodiments provide a method, executable by a network device, that receives a packet from a network at a first port of the network device. The method further sends the packet to a second port of the network device. The second port includes an interface and a loopback function implemented at an egress of the interface. The loopback function is configured to transmit the packet back to the network device through the interface. The interface is configured to truncate the packet upon receiving the packet from the loopback function. Upon receiving the truncated packet from the interface of the second port, the method also forwards the truncated packet to a device through a third port of the network device that is coupled to the device.

Egress truncation for tap aggregation devices

Some embodiments provide a method, executable by a network device, that receives a set of commands specifying an ingress interface of the network device and a set of packet attributes. The method further generates a test packet based on the set of packet attributes. The method also injects the test packet into a hardware packet processing pipeline of the network device so that the test packet appears, from the perspective of the hardware packet processing pipeline, to be received at the ingress interface of the network device. The method further processes the test packet through the hardware packet processing pipeline of the network device. The method also captures the test packet before the test packet exits an egress interface of a plurality of egress interfaces of the network device.

Predicting forwarding destinations for packets

A method and apparatus of a network element that enables truncation of tap aggregation data via snoop actions. In one embodiment, a network element configured for tap aggregation includes a first tap port to couple with a tap switch, a set of tool ports to transmit network data received from the first tap port to a data analyzer, and data plane logic to manage a mapping between the first tap port and the set of tool ports. A first tool port in the set of tool ports is configured for egress truncation and the data plane logic performs a snoop action to truncate a first unit of network data to be forwarded to the first tool port and a forward action to forward a second unit of network data to a second tool port in the set of tool ports without truncation.

Method and apparatus for tap aggregation and network data truncation

A ring network element and the ring network architectures it enables. According to one embodiment of the invention, a single network element includes a full TDM cross-connect and a multiple ring unit. The full TDM cross-connect is coupled to very line card slot in the single network element with the same amount of bandwidth connection. In addition, the full TDM cross-connect is programmable on an STS-1 basis. The multiple ring unit allows for the simultaneous support of multiple TDM rings.

Ring network element and the ring network architectures it enables

A method and apparatus for securing a layer II bridging switch for subscriber aggregation is described. The method receives packets from a circuit on the layer II bridging switch and makes a forwarding decision for each packet based on at least one of the addresses of the packet being currently assigned to a second circuit.

Method and apparatus for securing a layer II bridging switch/switch for subscriber aggregation

A ring network element and the ring network architectures it enables. According to one embodiment of the invention, a single network element includes a full TDM cross-connect and a multiple ring unit. The full TDM cross-connect is coupled to every line card slot in the single network element with the same amount of bandwidth connection. In addition, the full TDM cross-connect is programmable on an STS-1 basis. The multiple ring unit allows for the simultaneous support of multiple TDM rings.

In one embodiment, a network element is to be coupled to a first and second span of a number of spans that interconnect a set of network elements to form a ring network. In addition, each of the spans has two sub-spans on which traffic travels in opposite directions on a number of channels that circumvent the ring. Additionally, the channels on each sub-span include working channels and protecting channels. Furthermore, the network element includes a traffic handler to reprogram, responsive to protection switches and un-switches, the connection configuration on the protecting channels of the sub-spans of the first and second spans that provide traffic to the network element.

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Vancouver, Canada

James Chun Pang