The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jul. 25, 2000
Filed:
Feb. 19, 1999
James R Loehndorf, Jr, Crystal Lake, IL (US);
Stanley T Naudus, Jr, Springfield, VA (US);
D Richard Miller, Jr, Reston, VA (US);
Chang-Shan Hsu, N. Potomac, MD (US);
ASC - Advanced Switching Communications, Vienna, VA (US);
Abstract
A system is provided for creating a tunneling service from the use of a traditional tunneling protocol, such as the layer two tunneling protocol (L2TP). In particular, the L2TP tunneling protocol, which is designed to go point-to-point between an L2TP Access Concentrator (LAC) and an L2TP Network Server (LNS), is abstracted so that L2TP becomes an access protocol to a tunneling service. A new L2TP tunnel merger and management (LTM) service is created which severs the tight configuration relationships between LAC and LNSs. Only a tight configuration between an LAC and its LTM edge device and between an LNS and its LTM edge device is required. An internal trunk protocol (INT protocol) carries needed information between LTM edge devices to establish ingress/egress L2TP access calls inside of separate L2TP access tunnels on opposite LTM edge devices. The addition of another LAC is accomplished by re-routing L2TP tunnels within the LTM service without reconfiguration of the LNSs, and the addition of another LNS is accomplished by re-routing L2TP tunnels within the LTM service without reconfiguration of the LACs. The LTM service determines the need for both additional trunk and access resources and establishes both new trunk/access tunnels to provide additional resources. The LTM service also determines excess resources on both trunk and access entities and releases trunk/access tunnels to provide the needed additional resources.