Inner VXLAN tunnel packet detection

A method comprising:

• stripping, at an intermediate network device, encapsulation headers in layers above a virtual extensible local area network (“VXLAN”) packet encapsulating a Layer 2 (“L2”) frame of a data packet in response to receiving the data packet over a VXLAN, the intermediate network device located on a data pathway between VXLAN tunneling endpoints;
• reading, at the intermediate network device, a L2 frame type stored in a VXLAN header in the VXLAN packet to determine if the L2 frame type is a data protocol or a command protocol, in response to stripping the encapsulation headers;
• and
• re-encapsulating, at the intermediate network device, the VXLAN packet in a same format as the layers and associated encapsulation headers stripped from the received data packet in response to the L2 frame type being a data protocol indicating the L2 frame comprises data for transmission.

An apparatus comprising:

• a Layer 2 (“L2”) frame type reader configured to determine a type of a L2 frame prior to encapsulation of the L2 frame in a virtual extensible local area network (“VXLAN”) packet;
• a VXLAN encapsulator configured to encapsulate the L2 frame into a VXLAN packet, the VXLAN packet comprising a VXLAN header and the L2 frame;
• a L2 frame type header writer configured to write the determined L2 frame type in the VXLAN header of the VXLAN packet, the L2 frame type comprising one of a data protocol and a command protocol, the data protocol indicating that the L2 frame comprises data for transmission and the command protocol indicating that the L2 frame comprises a command for execution;
• a data packet encapsulator configured to encapsulate the VXLAN packet with additional layers to form a data packet suitable for transmission;
• and
• a transmitter configured to transmit the data packet in response to the data packet encapsulator forming the data packet.