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US 8,799,444 B2Granted
Automated host discovery and path tracing by network management server
AssigneeHewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
InventorsShaun Kazuo Wakumoto, Sarayu Chandrapal, Ballard Claude Bare
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Abstract
One embodiment described relates to an automated method of host discovery and path tracing by a network management server. The method includes discovery of a location in the network of a source host, discovery of a location in the network of a destination host, and discovery of a path from the source host to the destination host. Other embodiments are also described.
Claims15
A method of host discovery and path tracing, the method comprising:
- determining, by hardware, a closest neighbor switch in a network to a network management server among a plurality of switches in the network, wherein the determining of the closest neighbor switch includes:
- determining a MAC address of the network management server;
- looking up the MAC address of the network management server in an address table stored in a neighbor switch to identify a port of the neighbor switch associated with the MAC address;
- looking up, in a neighbor table stored in the neighbor switch, the port identified from the address table lookup to determine whether any neighbor device is associated with the port in the neighbor table;
- and
- in response to determining that no neighbor device is associated with the port from the lookup in the neighbor table, determining that the neighbor switch is the closest neighbor switch to the network management server among the plurality of switches in the network;
- discovering a location in the network of a source host based on the determining of the closest neighbor switch to the network management server;
- discovering a location in the network of a destination host based on the determining of the closest neighbor switch to the network management server;
- and
- discovering a path from the source host to the destination host based on the discovered locations.
7 more elements
A non-transitory computer readable medium storing computer-executable code executed by hardware to:
- determine a closest neighbor switch in a network to a network management server among a plurality of switches in the network, wherein the code to determine the closest neighbor switch includes code to:
- determine a MAC address of the network management server;
- look up the MAC address of the network management server in an address table stored in a neighbor switch to identify a port of the neighbor switch associated with the MAC address;
- look up, in a neighbor table stored in the neighbor switch, the port identified from the address table lookup to determine whether any neighbor device is associated with the port in the neighbor table;
- and
- in response to determining that no neighbor device is associated with the port from the lookup in the neighbor table, determine that the neighbor switch is the closest neighbor switch to the network management server among the plurality of switches in the network;
- and
- determine a path between network devices in the network based on determining the closest neighbor switch to the network management server.
5 more elements
A network management device comprising:
- a processor;
- and
- a memory storing computer-executable code executed by the processor to:
- determine an address of the network management device;
- look up the address of the network management device in an address table stored in a neighbor switch to identify a port of the neighbor switch associated with the address of the network management device;
- look up the port in a neighbor table stored in the neighbor switch to determine whether another neighbor switch is associated with the port of the neighbor switch in the neighbor table;
- in response to determining that no other neighbor switch is associated with the port of the neighbor switch from the lookup in the neighbor table, identify that the neighbor switch is a closest neighbor switch to the network management device among a plurality of switches in the network;
- and
- determine a path between network devices in the network based on identifying the closest neighbor switch to the network management device.
6 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.