Juniper Networks, Inc.

Cisco Technology, Inc.

Pankaj Patel

Pradeep S Sindhu

Dennis C Ferguson

Philippe Lacroute

Gerald Cheung

Tatao Chuang

Chi-Chung Kenny Chen

Hann-Hwan Ju

Stefan Alexander Dyckerhoff

Ashok Krishnamurthi

Ramalingam Krishnamurthi Anand

Viswesh Ananthakrishnan

Avanindra Godbole

Debashis Basu

Jeffrey Glenn Libby

Raymond Lim

Chang-Hong Wu

Viswesh Anathakrishnan

Shirish K Sathe

Dennis Fersuson

Visweh Ananthakrishnan

Satish D Deo

A key engine that performs route lookups for a plurality of keys may include a data processing portion configured to process one data item at a time and to request data when needed. A buffer may be configured to store a partial result from the data processing portion. A controller may be configured to load the partial result from the data processing portion into the buffer. The controller also may be configured to input another data item into the data processing portion for processing while requested data is obtained for a prior data item. A number of these key engines may be used by a routing unit to perform a large number of route lookups at the same time.

Context switched route look up key engine

Ordering logic ensures that data items being processed by a number of parallel processing units are unloaded from the processing units in the original per-flow order that the data items were loaded into the parallel processing units. The ordering logic includes a pointer memory, a tail vector, and a head vector. Through these three elements, the ordering logic keeps track of a number of 'virtual queues' corresponding to the data flows. A round robin arbiter unloads data items from the processing units only when a data item is at the head of its virtual queue.

Maintaining packet order using hash-based linked-list queues

A network device constructs a notification corresponding to a received multicast data unit, where the notification includes administrative data associated with the multicast data unit that does not include a payload of the multicast data unit. The network device replicates the notification at least three different processing elements at different locations in a processing path of the network device to produce multiple replicated data items and produces a copy of the multicast data unit for each of replicated notifications. The network device forwards each copy of the multicast data unit towards a multicast destination.

Systems and methods for efficient multicast handling

A bandwidth divider and method for allocating bandwidth between a plurality of packet processors. The bandwidth divider includes a plurality of counters for measuring the bandwidth of data packets transferred from the bandwidth divider to a respective packet processor; and a controller for analyzing the plurality of counters and transferring a data packet to a selected packet processor based on the contents of the counters. The method monitors the bandwidth consumed by the packet processors; determines, based on the bandwidth consumed by the packet processors, which packet processor has consumed the least amount of bandwidth; and allocates a next data packet to the packet processor which has consumed the least amount of bandwidth.

Bandwidth division for packet processing

A network device includes one or more sprayers, multiple packet processors, and one or more desprayers. The sprayers receive packets on at least one incoming packet stream and distribute the packets according to a load balancing scheme that balances the number of bytes of packet data that is given to each of the packet processors. The packet processors receive the packets from the sprayers and process the packets to determine routing information for the packets. The desprayers receive the processed packets from the packet processors and transmit the packets on at least one outgoing packet stream based on the routing information.

Preserving the order of packets through a device

Context switched route lookup key engine

A network device includes an interface and packet processing logic. The interface receives a multicast packet. The packet processing logic determines identifier data corresponding to the received multicast packet and replicates the identifier data to multiple outgoing packet forward engines at a first point in a processing path. The packet processing logic further replicates the identifier data to multiple data streams at a second point in the processing path and replicates the identifier data to multiple logical interfaces in the same stream at a third point in the processing path.

Growing community of inventors

Cupertino, CA, United States of America

Pankaj Patel