Cisco Technology, Inc.

Cisco Technologies, Inc.

Valentina Alaria

Davide Bergamasco

Flavio Giovanni Bonomi

Rong Pan

Andrea Baldini

Pere Monclus

Chiara Piglione

Thomas James Edsall

Silvano Gai

Ying Liu

Varagur Chandrasekaran

Atul Mahamuni

Vina Ermagan

Ming Zhang

Sushil Kumar Singh

Michele Caramello

Varagur V Chandrasekaran

The present invention provides improved methods and devices for managing network congestion. Preferred implementations of the invention allow congestion to be pushed from congestion points in the core of a network to reaction points, which may be edge devices, host devices or components thereof. Preferably, rate limiters shape individual flows of the reaction points that are causing congestion. Parameters of these rate limiters are preferably tuned based on feedback from congestion points, e.g., in the form of backward congestion notification ('BCN') messages. In some implementations, such BCN messages include congestion change information and at least one instantaneous measure of congestion. The instantaneous measure(s) of congestion may be relative to a threshold of a particular queue and/or relative to a threshold of a buffer that includes a plurality of queues.

Methods and devices for backward congestion notification

In one embodiment, a service enabled network (SEN) controller receives, from a control plane of a network service device, service instructions for corresponding network services. The SEN controller may then distribute the service instructions for the network services to appropriate network access devices within the computer network, such that each of the network access devices may correspondingly implement the network services at their respective data planes, thus providing a distributed implementation of the network service within the computer network.

Service enabled network

A method and a computer-readable storage medium are disclosed for flexible network measurement. Embodiments disclose receiving a network measurement request, transmitting portions of the request to network devices, configuring the network devices to collect metrics from packet data based on the portions of the request, and performing operations to generate metrics as a response to the network measurement request. Embodiments also disclose a flexible, dynamically configurable packet parser. Other embodiments are also disclosed.

Flexible network measurement

A metric measurement mechanism is used to determine network characteristics such as latency and round trip time with more precision than that available from layer three metric measurement mechanisms. The metric measurement mechanism can use the same architecture used by layer three metric measurement mechanisms while more accurately measuring network latency and isolating network device processing delays.

Methods and apparatus for improved determination of network metrics

In one embodiment, a method comprises the following steps: receiving a first set of inputs comprising a first plurality of entities and a first traffic behavior; determining a first region of a buffer corresponding to the first traffic behavior; assigning the first plurality of entities to the first region; determining hierarchical relationships between at least some of the first plurality of entities; determining a first shared buffer space of the first region; and assigning at least one threshold for each of the first plurality of entities. The threshold may comprise a maximum amount of the first shared buffer space that may be allocated to an entity. The method may also involve configuring a logic device to allocate the first shared buffer space dynamically according to the hierarchical relationships and the thresholds.

Flexible and hierarchical dynamic buffer allocation

In one embodiment, apparatus and methods for apparatus and methods for fair bandwidth allocation are disclosed. In one embodiment, a method includes (i) determining a drop probability for each of a plurality of classes of packets being dropped or admitted to a queue, wherein each drop probability is based on a weighted fair bandwidth allocation process that is performed with respect to the plurality of classes and a plurality of packet arrival rates and predefined weights for such classes; and (ii) dropping a particular packet or admitting such particular packet to the queue based on the drop probability for such particular packet's class, wherein such dropping or admitting operation is further based on one or more drop precedence factors that are also determined periodically for each class if such one or more drop precedence factors are selected for such each class. In other embodiments, the invention pertains to an apparatus having one or more processors and one or more memory, wherein at least one of the processors and memory are adapted for performing the above described method operations.

Apparatus and methods for hybrid fair bandwidth allocation and drop precedence

Novel methods and devices are provided for AQM of input-buffered network devices. Preferred implementations of the invention control overall buffer occupancy while protecting uncongested individual VOQs. The probability of setting a 'global drop flag' (which is not necessarily used to trigger packet drops, but may also be used to trigger other AQM responses) may depend, at least in part, on the lesser of a running average of buffer occupancy and instantaneous buffer occupancy. In some preferred embodiments, this probability also depends on the number of active VOQs. Moreover, a global drop flag is set in conjunction with a drop threshold M associated with the VOQs. Whether an AQM response is made may depend on whether a global drop flag has been set and whether a destination VOQ contains M or more packets. Different M values may be established for different classes of traffic, e.g., with higher M values for higher-priority traffic. AQM responses (e.g., to drop packets) may be taken more aggressively when there is a larger number of active VOQs.

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San Francisco, CA, United States of America

Valentina Alaria