Routing protocol support for half duplex virtual routing and forwarding instance

A network device comprising a memory, a processor, and a communications interface coupled together by an interconnection mechanism, the communications interface allowing the network device to communicate with other network devices over a network, the processor being operative to execute instructions from the memory to cause the network device to perform operations for providing dynamic routing support for Half-Duplex Virtual Routing and Forwarding (HDVRF) environments, the operations including:

• maintaining a forwarding Virtual Routing and Forwarding (VRF) table, the forwarding VRF table including information received from a hub in a hub and spoke environment in which the network device operates, the forwarding VRF table being used to forward incoming packets to a central location within the hub and spoke environment;
• maintaining a routing VRF table populated with routing information received from the hub and from ingress interfaces of the network device;
• propagating the routing information learned from the ingress interfaces to the hub;
• and
• forwarding packets received on at least one of the ingress interfaces according to the forwarding VRF table;
• wherein:
• the network device is a provider edge (PE) router and the ingress interfaces are respective interfaces to first and second customer edge (CE) routers, the CE routers being spoke routers of a customer network;
• the routing information learned from the ingress interfaces includes respective routing entries for network nodes reachable via the first and second CE routers;
• and
• the packets received on the at least one ingress interface are packets from the first CE router being sent to another node of the customer network reachable via the second CE router.