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AssigneeAlcatel
InventorsJohn Fischer, Chris Anastasiadis, Hansen Chan, David Watkinson
Estimating the term…
A heterogeneous point-to-point links involves different technologies at it two ends, e.g., Ethernet at one end and ATM or Frame Relay at the other end. If two IP systems are connected via a heterogeneous point-to-point link, each may be using different address learning techniques. It is up to the Provider Edge devices to make these different techniques inter-work. A novel provider edge device and procedures that the edge device it to perform for forwarding packets properly are described. According to the invention, the provider edge device uses a broadcast address to forward the packet in one direction toward a customer edge device. In another direction, the provider edge device responds to an ARP request from the customer edge device with its own MAC address so that it can receive a packet from the customer edge device.
A method of forwarding a packet from a first node to a second node over an Ethernet link which forms an end segment of a point-to-point layer 2 link, comprising steps of:
A method of receiving at a first node a packet from a second node over an Ethernet link which forms an end segment of a point-to-point layer 2 link, the packet to be forwarded to a remote node of the point-to-point layer 2 link, comprising steps of:
A method of forwarding a packet from a first node in one of two directions, downstream and upstream, over a point-to-point layer 2 link which contains an Ethernet segment at a downstream end, the Ethernet segment carrying the first node and a second node, the second node being downstream from the first node, comprising steps of:
A node for forwarding a packet in one of two directions, downstream and upstream, over a point-to-point layer 2 link which contains an Ethernet segment at a downstream end, the node to be located upstream of a second node on the Ethernet segment, comprising:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.