Cisco Technology, Inc.

Stephen Cho

Sunil Potti

Sandeep Kumar

Ricky Keangpo Ho

Karempudi V Ramarao

Tefcros Anthias

Yi Jin

Kollivakkam Raghavan

Alex Yiu-Man Chan

Raj K De Datta

Parley Van Oleson

Tefcros Anthias, Jr

Alex Yin-Man Chan

A method is disclosed for high-speed processing of structured application messages in a network device. According to one aspect, a network device receives a structured application layer message and identifies, in message classification requirements at the network device, a reference to a classification portion of the structured application layer message and an operation portion of the structured application layer message. The system extracts, based on one or more expressions, a portion of the message for classifying the structured application layer message and classifies the message using the extracted portion and according to the message classification requirements. At least in part by accessing information indicated by one or more location identifiers, at least one operation is performed on the classified structured application layer message.

Method and apparatus for high-speed processing of structured application messages in a network device

A method is disclosed for high-speed processing of structured application messages in a network device. According to one aspect, a network device receives a set of message classification rules that have been prepared beforehand by a system administrator or customer. The system analyzes the message classification rules to determine what part(s) of the message are necessary to classify a message according to the message classification rules. This allows the system to consider only the relevant parts of the message and ignore the rest of the message. The system extracts the portion of the message necessary for classifying the message and classifies the message using the values of the extracted information and the message classification rules. A unique sequence of operations is implied by the message classification and those operations must then be applied to the message.

A method is disclosed for generating a network topology representation based on inspection of application messages at a network device. According to one aspect, a network device receives a request packet, routes the packet to the destination, and extracts and stores correlation information from a copy of the request packet. When the network device receives a response packet, it examines the contents of a copy of the response packet using context-based correlation rules and matches the response packet with the appropriate stored request packet correlation information. It analyzes recorded correlation information to determine application-to-application mapping and calculate application response times. Another embodiment inserts custom headers that contain information used to match a response packet with a request packet into request packets.

Method and apparatus for generating a network topology representation based on inspection of application messages at a network device

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Palo Alto, CA, United States of America

Stephen Cho