Local forwarding bias in a multi-chassis router
AssigneeJuniper Networks, Inc.
InventorsEric L. Peterson, Satish Katpally, Steven Onishi
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Techniques are described for reducing the amount of data traffic carried on inter-chassis links within a multi-chassis router. A multi-chassis router is described in which the packet forwarding engines (PFEs) of each chassis receive and modify forwarding structures, generated in accordance with various load-balancing protocols, to exhibit a chassis-local link preference. Each of the PFEs may implement a selection bias for forwarding paths that egress from the multi-chassis router at the member chassis that includes the ingress PFE.
Claims20
A router comprising:
- a plurality of routing chassis operating as a single node within a network, wherein a first routing chassis and a second routing chassis of the router each include an egress interface to a network destination;
- an inter-chassis link connecting the first routing chassis and the second routing chassis;
- and
- a forwarding plane of the first routing chassis that receives a forwarding structure that associates the egress interface of the first routing chassis and the egress interface of the second routing chassis with the network destination,
- wherein the forwarding plane modifies the forwarding structure to select the egress interface of the first routing chassis to implement a forwarding path preference to reduce utilization of the inter-chassis link by network packets destined for the network destination.
A method comprising:
- receiving a forwarding structure with a forwarding plane of a first routing chassis of a multi-chassis router, wherein the router comprises a plurality of routing chassis operating as a single node within a network, wherein the first routing chassis and a second routing chassis of the router each include an egress interface to a network destination and are connected by an inter-chassis link, and wherein the forwarding structure associates the egress interface of the first routing chassis and the egress interface of the second routing chassis with the network destination;
- modifying, with the forwarding plane, the forwarding structure to select the egress interface of the first routing chassis to implement a forwarding path preference to reduce utilization of the inter-chassis link by network packets destined for the network destination.
A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions for causing one or more programmable processors to:
- receive a forwarding structure with a forwarding plane of a first routing chassis of a multi-chassis router, wherein the router comprises a plurality of routing chassis operating as a single node within a network, wherein the first routing chassis and a second routing chassis of the router each include an egress interface to a network destination and are connected by an inter-chassis link, and wherein the forwarding structure associates the egress interface of the first routing chassis and the egress interface of the second routing chassis with the network destination;
- modify, with the forwarding plane, the forwarding structure to select the egress interface of the first routing chassis to implement a forwarding path preference to reduce utilization of the inter-chassis link by network packets destined for the network destination.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.