Method and system for looping back traffic in QIQ ethernet rings and 1:1 protected PBT trunks

[0001] This application is a continuation-in-part-of patent application Ser. No. 11/477,975, filed Jun. 29, 2006, entitled Q-IN-Q ETHERNET RINGS, the entirety of which is incorporated herein by reference. This application also claims priority to Provisional Application Ser. No. 60/917,131, filed May 10, 2007, entitled LOOP BACK BASED FAST PROTECTION MECHANISM FOR PBT, the entirety of which is incorporated herein by reference.

[0002] n/a

[0003] The present invention relates generally to Ethernet and, in particular, to Ethernet rings for Metro Area Networks and to switching networks that significantly reduce the delay associated with looped back traffic due to network faults.

[0004] Because of its “flood-and-learn” nature, standard Ethernet (IEEE 802.3) is generally unsuitable for network topologies where there is more than one path between any two nodes. The existence of a parallel path creates a loop around which the Ethernet frames circle endlessly, thus overburdening the network. Therefore, Ethernet is best suited to a tree topology rather than a ring. However, ring topologies are desirable for deploying Ethernet in Metro Area Networks where ring topologies are desirable, e.g. for resiliency.

[0005] Deployment of large (metro area) Ethernet rings is hindered, however, by the fact that Ethernet rings are prone to endlessly loop unless protocols such as IEEE 802.1D Spanning Tree Protocol (STP) or IEEE 802.1W Rapid Reconfiguration are used to detect and disable parallel branches that create loops. While Spanning Tree Protocol and Rapid Reconfiguration can eliminate loops on Ethernet rings, these protocols introduce recovery lags in the order of tens of seconds, i.e. the time to recover from a fault in the ring is unacceptably high for customers who expect seamless connectivity and undetectable fault correction. In other words, customers expect connectivity to be restored within approximately 50 ms (like SONET does).

[0006] A further shortcoming of current Ethernet ring technology as defined in 802.17 is that the MAC-PHY chip that determines which direction to send traffic around the ring is a specialized component where innovation and available bandwidth typically lags other, simpler, Ethernet PHY implementations. Thus, even if all the other components of the Ethernet switches are capable of handling higher rates, as is currently achievable, the ring MAC-PHY chip limits the overall bit-rate of the ring.

[0007] Thus, it remains highly desirable to provide a simple, resilient and high-speed virtual ring for frame-based traffic such as Ethernet, particularly for Metro Area Networks.

[0008] An additional shortcoming of current network topologies is the unwanted time delay that occurs when, due to a fault in the system, transmitted data packets are returned or “looped back” to the originating source node. While a secondary path is used to handle traffic that can no longer be delivered to its destination via the primary path due to the fault, significant delay time is accumulated due to the time that it takes for traffic to travel to the point of failure and then travel back to its originating node.

[0009] Thus, it remains highly desirable to provide a method and system that can significantly reduce the time delay caused by traffic being looped back to the source node due to a fault on the network's primary path.

[0010] An aspect of the present invention is to provide a simple, resilient and high-speed virtual ring for frame-based traffic such as Ethernet that redresses one or more of the deficiencies in the prior art as described above. The resilient virtual ring has a plurality of nodes interconnected by working and protection virtual paths. The virtual ring will have a working path in which traffic flows in one direction, and a protection path in which the traffic flows in the opposite direction. It is conceivable to have multiple virtual rings which have the same routing for the working path and for the protection paths. It is similarly possible to envision multiple virtual rings where the routing is a mirror image, the routing of one or more rings protection path corresponding to the routing of the working path or path of other rings. It is similarly possible to consider a node to simultaneously be a ring node on several topologically disjoint rings at the same time. Each virtual ring implements a unique Ethernet broadcast domain. Each virtual ring is implemented via configured connectivity for a set of VLANs. Traffic upon insertion into the ring is tagged using ring tags which serve to identify the originating station on the ring and are associated with the specific broadcast domain. These tags are removed when the traffic leaves the ring. For Ethernet, these ring tags are VLAN IDs (VIDs) and the insertion of VLAN tags is described in IEEE standard 802.1ad. When traffic enters the ring, the ingress node tags the traffic with a working-path VID which also identifies the entry point to the ring.

[0011] It should be noted that the virtual ring mechanism uses VLAN tagging, and configured VLAN forwarding. This behavior can be deployed on nodes in conjunction with other styles of Ethernet forwarding such as spanning tree or static configuration of MAC tables via simply partitioning the VLAN space.

[0012] Ring nodes perform normal Ethernet bridging operations, in particular populating the forwarding database via source learning. Although traffic in each broadcast domain is distinguished by a plurality of VLAN IDs (one per ring node for each of the working and protection paths), Shared VLAN Learning (SVL) permits the set of ring nodes to use a common set of learned MAC forwarding information. In order to preserve directionality around the ring, “port aliasing” is performed to record a port direction that is opposite to the port direction that would normally be learned by the node in traditional bridge operation. For example, in an Emulated LAN (ELAN) implementation, MAC addresses are only learned in one direction around the ring, i.e. on the working path. A packet observed as arriving on one ring port has source learning recorded as if the packet arrived on the other ring port. In this way, although the ring physically attaches to the node via two distinct ports, it logically appears as a single port. For ELAN, MAC learning is disabled on all protection-path VIDs.

[0013] Traffic only ingresses or egresses the ring via the working path. This is achieved by standard VLAN configuration such that off-ring ports associated with the ring broadcast domain are not blocked for the set of working VLANs associated with the ring. Copies of broadcast, multicast or packets for which the path to the destination is unknown by the ring nodes will typically egress the ring at all ports associated with the ring broadcast domain. A copy of such packets will traverse the ring back to the node of origin where the ring tag allows such packets to be identified as having circumnavigated the ring and consequently discarded at the originating node (termed “source stripping”). Packets directed around the ring may also encounter ring nodes which have “learned” off-ring connectivity, at which point the packet will be removed from the ring and forwarded to the off-ring destination (termed “destination stripping”).

[0014] In the event of a failure in a span between two nodes in the ring, the ring folds as a resiliency mechanism to isolate the failed span. To enable ring folding, each node has a cross-connect for cross-connecting the working path to the protection path, which is implemented by VLAN translation, the working VLAN is mapped 1:1 to a protection VLAN forwarded in the reverse direction to the working path. Thus, if a span fails, the two end nodes immediately adjacent to the span failure isolate the failure by cross-connecting their working and protection paths. This cross-connection folds the ring to thus transfer traffic from the working path onto the protection path at the first of the two end nodes immediately adjacent the failure. The traffic is then carried over the protection path all the way to the second of the two end nodes immediately adjacent the failure whereupon the traffic is cross-connected back onto the working path for egress from the working path. In this way, “learned” forwarding information used for destination stripping, and tag information associated with source stripping is fully applicable independent of the fault status of the ring, and a ring failure is transparent to all nodes not immediately adjacent to the failure (which perform the selector operation of mapping the working to the protection paths).

[0015] Therefore, existing specified bridge implementations employing the tagging of ring traffic using Q-in-Q stacking, VLAN translation and by using Shared VLAN Learning in combination with port aliasing (to permit source learning to be applied to a broadcast domain implemented as a unidirectional ring path), a virtual Ethernet ring can be constructed that does not suffer from the shortcomings that hamper prior-art implementations. Moreover, the ring is made resilient by virtue of the cross-connects at each node which allow the ring to fold to isolate a span failure. Even once the ring has folded, traffic continues to ingress to or egress from the working path only.

[0016] Accordingly, an aspect of the present invention provides a method of routing frame-based traffic over a resilient virtual ring having a commonly routed working path and a protection path per ring node. The method includes the steps of defining, for each node of the ring, a plurality of unique ring tags that uniquely identify each one of the nodes and whether the working path or the protection path is to carry the traffic, and tagging frames in the virtual ring with one of the ring tags to uniquely identify both the node that has tagged the frames and whether the traffic is being carried over the working path or the protection path.

[0017] The frame-based traffic can be Ethernet, in which case the ring tags are VLAN IDs (VIDs) that are tagged to the Ethernet frames using Q-in-Q VLAN stacking.

[0018] Another aspect of the present invention provides a resilient virtual ring having a plurality of nodes interconnected by a working path and a protection path, each of the plurality of nodes including ingress and egress ports for frame-based traffic entering and leaving the virtual ring, wherein each node comprises a plurality of ring tags for uniquely tagging traffic in the ring, the ring tags identifying both the node that has tagged the traffic and whether the traffic is carried by the working path or the protection path. Where the frame-based traffic are Ethernet frames, Q-in-Q VLAN stacking enables tagging of the frames with unique VLAN IDs (VIDs).

[0019] Another aspect of the invention provides a method for reducing delay in a fast protection switching network caused by the looping back of transmitted packets. The method includes detecting occurrence of a loopback condition due to a failure on the primary path, halting transmission of packets between a source node and the destination node on the primary path, and starting transmission of the packets between the source node and the destination node on a secondary path.

[0020] In another aspect of the invention, a fast protection switching system is provided. The system includes a primary path and a secondary path. The primary path includes a source node and a destination node. The secondary path includes the source node and the destination node. The source node and the destination node halt transmission of packets on the primary path and switch transmission of the packets to the secondary path upon detection of a loopback condition.

[0021] In yet another aspect of the invention, an apparatus for a fast protection switching system is provided. The switching system includes a primary path and a secondary path to a destination node. The apparatus includes a network interface subsystem, where the network interface subsystem is arranged to transmit packets to the destination node using the primary path and the secondary path. The apparatus further includes a processor in communication with the interface subsystem. The processor operates to detect a loopback condition and halt transmission of the packets to the destination node via the primary path upon detection of a loopback condition.

[0042] It will be noted that throughout the appended drawings, like features are identified by like reference numerals.

[0043] It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that the present invention is not limited to what has been particularly shown and described herein above. In addition, unless mention was made above to the contrary, it should be noted that all of the accompanying drawings are not to scale. A variety of modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teachings without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention, which is limited only by the following claims.

[0044] In general, and as will be elaborated below with respect to the specific embodiments illustrated in FIGS. 1-6, the present invention provides both a resilient, virtual ring for frame-based traffic such as, preferably, Ethernet as well as a method of routing frame-based (e.g. Ethernet) traffic over a resilient, virtual ring. Although the embodiments described below are implemented in Ethernet, it should be understood that the invention could be applied to other frame-based networks.

[0045] A resilient, virtual Ethernet ring designated generally by reference numeral 10 in FIG. 1A has a plurality of nodes (labeled A, B, C and D) interconnected by a working path 12 and a protection path 14 per ring node, FIG. 1A being an exemplar of a single instance of what would be replicated once per node on the ring. Each path being implemented via VLAN configuration (the blocking and unblocking of ports). As will be appreciated by those of ordinary skill in the art, the virtual ring can be virtualized from a non-ring topology such as a mesh; in other words, there does need to be an actual physical ring architecture for implementation of this virtual ring. Furthermore, it should be understood that, while four nodes are illustrated, this is merely presented by way of example, i.e. the number of nodes on the ring can vary.

[0046] Each of the plurality of nodes A-D may include ingress ports and egress ports for traffic entering and leaving the virtual ring, respectively. Similarly, the virtual ring may transit nodes which do not have ingress/egress ports but do participate in ring behavior. Associated with each node is a set of ring tags for tagging the frames of traffic in the ring. In other words, a plurality of unique ring tags are defined for each node of the ring. The ring tags identify whether the associated ring path is the working path or the protection path and the unique identity of the ring node on that path. So a set of VLAN tags (one per ring station) is associated with the working path of a unidirectional ring and a corresponding set of tags is associated with the protection path of a unidirectional ring. The routing of the protection path being congruent with the working path, the forwarding direction is thus simply the reverse of that of the working path.

[0047] In the preferred embodiment, the ring tags are virtual local area network identifiers or VLAN IDs (VIDs) for tagging Ethernet frames in the ring. Thus, in the generalized case, each node in the ring has a unique set of W-VID and P-VID identifiers that are used to tag traffic in the ring so as to identify the node that has tagged the traffic as well as which of the working path and protection path is carrying the traffic. The VIDs identify both a specific virtual ring (i.e. in a trivial topology case “east” or “west”), whether the traffic is carried on the working path or on the protection path, and the node originating traffic onto that ring. It should be noted that, as the technique permits the virtualization of VLAN tagged rings, a node could conceivably participate in many disjoint virtual rings and be provisioned with a corresponding set of VLAN tags to participate in each ring.

[0048] The Ethernet frames can be tagged using Q-in-Q stacking (also written as QinQ). Q-in-Q stacking is an encapsulation protocol defined in IEEE 802.1ad which is hereby incorporated by reference.

[0049] For the purposes of this specification, the expression “west”, “westward” or “westbound” shall mean clockwise around the ring whereas the expressions “east”, “eastward” or “eastbound” shall mean counter-clockwise around the ring.

[0050] In the preferred embodiment, the virtual Ethernet ring is constructed so that traffic entering the ring is forwarded along the working path, and may only leave the ring via the working path, traffic on the protection path is constrained to the ring to prevent undesirable duplication to off-ring nodes. Traffic is never inserted directly into the protection path, so the fact that it is an uninterrupted ring with no egress is a non-issue. Traffic is only cross-connected onto the protection path when the ring structure has been broken due to a fault. Thus, in the preferred embodiment, the frame-based traffic entering a given node is tagged with a VID that identifies that the traffic is being inserted onto the working path and the point of insertion. Furthermore, in the preferred embodiment, the ring is said to be “unidirectional” because the working path is unidirectional in the arbitrarily chosen direction around the ring while the protection path is also unidirectional albeit in the opposite direction around the ring. The actual association of traffic from an off-ring point to a particular ring-based broadcast domain is performed by normal Ethernet classification means as specified in 802.1ad whereby either tag or port information is used as a ring selector. Similarly a ring node may implement ports wholly not associated with ring behavior.

[0051] Thus, when traffic enters the ring at a node (hereinafter an “ingress node”), each packet entering the ring is tagged with a unique VID identifying to the switch fabric that the traffic is to be inserted onto the working path of a specific virtual ring. Since the working path is unidirectional, no routing decision needs to be made at the ingress node, which therefore obviates the need for a direction-determining MAC-PHY chip at the ingress node which, as noted above, is not only an expensive component but only limits bit-rate. It should be noted that VLANs are bi-directional, but uni-directionality is an artifact of how VLANs are used to create ring paths. As only a single node may insert traffic tagged with the VID of a specific working VLAN, and that VLAN will be blocked for the port corresponding to the return path once traffic has circumnavigated the ring, there will be only one egress port for the VLAN from the ring node.

[0052] Moreover, since the traffic entering the ring is tagged with a VID that is unique, and port blocking for that VID is performed on the return port for the virtual ring, the ingress node will perform “source stripping”, i.e. discarding traffic that has returned “unclaimed” to the ingress node. In other words, traffic is discarded (stripped out) if none of the other nodes in the ring recognize the destination MAC address or if the packet was intended to be replicated to all ring nodes. In other words, if traffic has circled back around the entire ring without being claimed by any other node, then it is discarded by the ingress node (because the working VLAN is blocked on the port of return). Thus, the ingress node discards received traffic that is tagged with the ring tag assigned by the ingress node when the traffic first entered the ring.

[0053] Source stripping thus ensures that traffic does not loop endlessly around the ring. If another node on the ring recognizes the MAC address as being one that is served by that node, then the node (acting as an “egress node”, that is) forwards the packet to a non-ring port. It should be noted that the actual forwarding behavior of ring nodes is that of standard 802 bridge forwarding. Broadcast, multicast and unknown packets are forwarded on both ring ports and replicated on local non-ring ports which are configured to participate in the ring broadcast domain. A ring node may have a MAC forwarding entry for a given destination address that points to a ring port or points to an off-ring port. In the scenario where a MAC forwarding entry exists for an “off-ring” port, the ring node will (as an artifact of normal bridge operation) perform “destination stripping” such that the packet only traverses a portion of the overall ring.

[0054] In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention, each node also includes a “port aliasing module” for receiving the learned MAC addresses and for recording in the forwarding table a port direction that is opposite to an actual port direction detected by the node. As the ring/broadcast domain is unidirectional, it logically is a single port but in actual implementation is an ingress and an egress. Normal Ethernet source learning will attempt to associate learned MAC addresses of traffic received from other ring nodes with the ingress port, while the desirable behavior is to actually associate the forwarding for those MAC addresses to the egress port for the ring as the only viable path around the ring is unidirectional. Port aliasing permits the translation of learned information from ingress to egress prior to forwarding of traffic. This may be done prior to or subsequent to insertion of learned information into the local forwarding database. Precisely when the value is aliased is an implementation issue.

[0055] FIG. 1A is a schematic illustration of an Ethernet VLAN ring configured for 1:1 protection for Emulated LAN (ELAN) or Source Specific Broadcast (SSB) in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In this example, the ring 10 has working and protection paths interconnecting four nodes A, B, C and D. In this example, traffic inserted at A is tagged with a Working VID (W-VID) corresponding to a configured working path routed A, B, C, D. There is also configured a protection VID (P-VID) configured in the reverse direction D, C, B, A with corresponding port membership for the VIDs being configured on the ring nodes. In this example, the VIDs are referenced with respect to Node A. Similar and co-routed (but different VIDs) would of course also be assigned for Nodes B, C and D. For Emulated LAN (ELAN), a total of two VIDs per virtual ring per ring node are required. For Source Specific Multicast (emulation of a p2mp, i.e. a point-to-multipoint, tree over the ring), a total of 4 VIDs per virtual ring are required. For Source Specific Broadcast (SSB), a total of two VIDs per virtual ring are required, in this case Working and Protection. In a simple variant, the VID can further identify which of the two directions around the ring the traffic is carried. Thus, in this particular variant, a West Working VID, West Protection VID, East Working VID and East Protection VID are defined for each node and, depending on which of the two directions is arbitrarily chosen for the working path, either the west VIDs or the east VIDs are used.

[0056] FIG. 1B is an enlarged schematic illustration of Node A of FIG. 1A operating in a fault-free state. In this example, Node A adds a ring tag to all the Ethernet frames (traffic) entering the ring. In this case, the ring tag added to the frames is W-VID because the traffic is being routed on the working path. As shown in FIG. 1B, Node A passes the P-VID and blocks the W-VID on the east port.

[0057] FIG. 1C is an enlarged schematic illustration of Nodes B, C and D of FIG. 1A operating in a fault-free state. In this example, Nodes B, C and D pass the P-VID (as did Node A) but these nodes pass the W-VID and takes a copy, removing the ring tag (VID) when the traffic is taken off the ring.

[0058] Accordingly, large (metro-sized), simple and inexpensive Ethernet rings can be implemented using 802.1Q-compliant hardware, i.e. using Q-tagging to form a resilient QinQ ring whose behavior appears to be that of an 802.1Q-compliant bridge. Furthermore, as will be described below, these rings can be made resilient.

[0059] Resiliency (1:1 Protection)

[0060] The virtual Ethernet ring is made resilient (or “fault-tolerant”) by virtue of its ring topology (which is an inherently resilient topology because it is capable of ring folding to isolate a span failure), the presence of a protection path providing 1:1 protection, and the presence of cross-connects at each node that are capable of “hairpinning” the traffic when the ring folds, as is explained in the following paragraphs.

[0061] Each node in the ring has its own cross-connect for cross-connecting the working path to the protection path. This enables ring folding in response to a failure detected in a span of the ring. Detecting a span failure can be done using any known span failure detection mechanism such as described in IEEE 802.1ag or 802.3ah EFM (“Ethernet First Mile”), which are hereby incorporated by reference. Folding the ring isolates the span failure and, due to the availability of the protection path, ensures that traffic continues to be forwarded seamlessly to destination nodes.

[0062] As shown in FIG. 2A, the ring 10 can fold in response to a span failure 16 by cross-connecting the working path 12 and the protection path 14 at the two “end nodes” 18, 20 immediately on either side of the span failure. This will be referred to herein as “hairpinning” since the traffic takes what can be visualized as a “hairpin curve” (as shown in FIG. 2A) as it is switched from the working path onto the protection path at the first end node 18, i.e. the last node that the traffic encounters on the working path just before the span failure. The traffic is then carried all the way back to the second end node 20 on the protection path (in the opposite direction) at which point this same traffic is then “hairpinned” again (i.e. cross-connected) back onto the working path. The failed span provides the “selector” synchronization mechanism for the protection switch. The net effect of the cross connecting at both ring nodes adjacent to the failure is that the protection path acts as a “bypass” to loop the traffic back to the working path while preserving the unidirectionality of the ring. Folding the ring using this double-hairpin arrangement not only preserves the unidirectionality of the working path but also ensures that traffic can only ingress or egress the ring from the working path. In other words, the working path always remains the working path even after a span fault.

[0063] As shown in FIG. 2B, the first end node 18 (i.e. Node C in this example) cross-connects W-VID to P-VID (to thus effect a port egress translation). Similarly, as shown in FIG. 2C, the second end node 20 (i.e. Node D in this example) cross-connects P-VID to W-VID (to thus effect a port ingress translation).

[0064] A useful attribute of this arrangement is that protection switching is “hitless” with respect to MAC learning for ELAN and SSM. In other words, the ring folding preserves the topology with respect to learned MAC addresses.

[0065] As another example, FIGS. 3A-3C and FIGS. 4A-4C illustrate respectively the operation and folding of a virtual Ethernet ring configured for 1:1 protection to enable Source-Specific Multicast (SSM). In SSM, the configuration of connectivity is constrained such that only the source node (termed root) has connectivity to all other ring nodes (termed leaves), i.e. the other ring nodes can only communicate with the source. The SSM head-end only needs to know that a given ring node is interested, but does not need to know which one. Two working VIDs are required, one for the head-end to the leaves, and the other for the leaves to the head-end. Two protection VIDs are required, one for the working VID (root to leaf connectivity) and one for the working return VID (leaf to root connectivity). As shown in these figures, the working path 12 has a protection path 14, and the return path 22 is protected by a protection return 24.

[0066] Therefore, for a given SSM virtual ring, there are four paths, and four VIDs are defined for the ring. These VIDs can be designated as follows: Working (W-VID), Working Return (WR-VID), Protection (P-VID) and Protection Return (PR-VID).

[0067] As shown in FIG. 3B, Node A operates in a fault-free state by passing P-VID and PR-VID while blocking W-VID on the east port. Traffic entering the ring at Node A is tagged with W-VID and sent onto the ring via the west port of Node A (assuming, for this example, a westward working direction) while return traffic is taken off the ring on WR-VID.

[0068] As shown in FIG. 3C, Nodes B, C and D operate in a fault-free state by also passing P-VID and PR-VID. At each of Nodes B, C and D, the node passes W-VID and takes a copy (stripping the VID as the traffic egresses the ring). Each of these nodes also passes WR-VID and inserts traffic onto W-VID by assigning a ring tag (W-VID).

[0069] As shown in FIGS. 4A-4C, the Ethernet ring 10 folds in response to a failure 16 in the span, e.g. between Nodes C and D. As shown in FIG. 4B, Node C (the first end node 18) cross-connects W-VID to P-VID and WR-VID to PR-VID (to thus effect a port egress translation). As shown in FIG. 4C, Node D (the second end node 20) cross-connects P-VID to W-VID (to thus effect a port ingress translation).

[0070] Accordingly, a highly resilient, unidirectional, virtual Ethernet ring can be created having one protection path per working path, thus providing 1:1 protection for either ELAN and SSB implementations or an SSM implementation.

[0071] Resiliency (1+1 Protection)

[0072] In another embodiment, as shown in FIGS. 5A-5C, a 1+1 protection arrangement can be implemented by sending (“bi-casting”) traffic in opposite directions on both the working and protection paths 12, 14 of the ring 10. In this 1+1 protection scenario, the ingress node not only sends the same traffic (i.e. the same frames) in opposite directions around the ring, but it also sends Connectivity Fault Management (CFM) heartbeats in both directions around the ring. The CFM heartbeats enable a destination node on the ring to select one of the two received copies of the bi-cast traffic based on the characteristics of the CFM heartbeats received at the destination node.

[0073] As shown in FIG. 5B, Node A adds ring tags as traffic enters the ring as is bi-cast onto both the W-VID and P-VID. Node A also blocks P-VID and W-VID on the east port. As shown in FIG. 5C, each one of Nodes B, C and D has a selector that uses IEEE 802.1ag and G.8031 to select which of the two sets of bi-cast traffic it will treat as the working-path traffic. The VID is stripped when traffic exits the ring. Each node passes W-VID and takes a copy. Each node also passes P-VID and takes a copy.

[0074] VID Seizing

[0075] At initialization of the ring, a range of VLANs is delegated to the operation of the ring, and the appropriate ring connectivity is configured via configuring of port membership for the VLAN set on each ring node. Each node may then self-discover and seize a set of unique ring tags (the subset of tags in the range delegated to the ring that will be used by the specific ring node). At each node, ring tags are randomly selected and tested. To test the ring tags, the node attempts to ping itself with a frame tagged with the selected working path ring tag. If the ring tag is not in use by any node in the ring, the node will be able to ping itself (i.e. there is uninterrupted connectivity around the ring). Otherwise, if the selected ring tag is already in use by another node in the ring, the node will not be able to ping itself because the actual owner of that selected working ring tag (i.e. another node) will have blocked the port for that ring tag in order to do source stripping.

[0076] For a virtual Ethernet ring (e.g. ELAN), each node would need to seize two unique VIDs. VID discovery and seizing is done by randomly selecting a potentially usable VID associated with a specific ring at each node being initialized, sending the potentially usable VID around the ring to try to ping oneself and then seizing the VID if it returns unclaimed to the node that sent the VID. These steps are repeated until the node being initialized has pinged itself at least twice. The seizing is complete when a block of 2 VIDs are “owned” by the node being initialized.

[0077] When the entire ring powers up at once, it is important to institute random delays in the self-discovery process to avoid “race conditions”. Thus, a given node should wait a random period of time before selecting a ring tag and attempting to ping itself.

[0078] Moreover, to be safe, the node should ping itself a couple of times with the same ring tag to be certain that the VID is truly not in use and thus can legitimately be seized. When the node seizes a ring tag, it modifies the configuration for the seized range of ring tags from the default to the owned state.

[0079] Node Implementation

[0080] FIG. 6 schematically illustrates, by way of example only, an Ethernet ring node (“Node X”) in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 6, Node X has a routing switch 30 (e.g. Nortel 8608 or equivalent) and a switch fabric module 40 (e.g. Nortel 8692 or equivalent). The routing switch 30 has an ingress port 32 and an egress port 34 for traffic entering and exiting the ring. The routing switch 34 includes a mapping module 36 (or other such means) for mapping a C-VID (Customer VID) received on the ingress port to a ring VID and pushing the frames to the switch fabric module 40. The routing switch 34 also includes a VID-stripping module 38 (or other such means) for stripping the ring VID from the traffic before it exits the ring via the egress port 34.

[0081] As further illustrated in FIG. 6, the switch fabric module 40 includes forwarding memory 42, a port aliasing module 44, and a 802.1Q bridge 46. The memory 42 maintains the forwarding table, e.g. the Forwarding Information Base, into which MAC addresses and port directions are stored. The port aliasing module 44, as mentioned above, stores a port direction that is opposite to the actual learned direction. This port aliasing preserves the unidirectionality of the ring. Traffic is switched by the 0.1Q bridge 48 onto either the West PHY 50 or the East PHY 52.

[0082] Applications of the Virtual Ethernet Ring

[0083] The ring is able to support a variety of Ethernet applications, including ELINE, E-TREE, Emulated LAN (ELAN), Source-Specific Multicast (SSM), and Source-Specific Broadcast (SSB). In the ELINE and E-TREE scenarios, the ring serves as a Provider Backbone Bridge (PBB) within a Provider Backbone Transport (PBT) network, which are described in U.S. Patent Application Publication 2005/0220096 entitled TRAFFIC ENGINEERING IN FRAME-BASED CARRIER NETWORKS published Oct. 6, 2005, which is hereby incorporated by reference. For ELINE and E-TREE, the PBT provides e2e PS (end-to-end protection switching) so the ring must not interfere with the PBT VID range. For ELAN, the ring operates as a resilient distributed switch. For SSM, the ring acts to resiliently fan out a dynamically varying set of (S,G) multicast groups to a set of ring nodes. For SSM, the ring must also provide a constrained return path for IGMP snooping/filtering. For SSB, the ring acts to resiliently fan out an invariant bundle of (S,G) multicast groups to a set of ring nodes, but unlike SSM, no return path is required. The virtual ring should be able to support all of these applications simultaneously.

[0084] Node Configurations for Specific Implementations

[0085] In order to simultaneously accommodate different applications or “behaviors”, e.g. ELAN, SSM and SSB, a range of VIDs is designated for each type of application or “behavior”, i.e. a range of VIDs is designated for ELAN, another range of VIDs for SSM and yet another range of VIDs for SSB. The default is for each node to pre-configure each range and then, as required, seize specific VIDs in each range.

[0086] For ELINE (such as Provider Backbone Transport, which offers its own end-to-end resiliency), a fixed network VID range is assigned.

[0087] Emulated LAN (ELAN) can be enabled by specifying, in a generalized case, only two VIDs per ring node, namely a Working VID (W-VID) and a Protection VID (P-VID). In the specific case where the VIDs are to further identify ring direction, four VIDs are defined per ring node, e.g. a West Working VID, a West Protection VID, an East Working VID and an East Protection VID. Each node needs to both relay and take a copy of Working VIDs. Each node simply needs to connect Protection VIDs between ring ports. MAC learning is disabled on the Protection VIDs.

[0088] Source Specific Multicast (SSM) can be enabled by specifying four VIDs per SSM ring (for the generalized case), i.e. a Working VID, Working Return VID, Protection VID and Protection Return VID. Each node needs to both relay and take a copy of Working VIDs. Each node needs to connect Protection and Working Return VIDs together. MAC learning is disabled on all VIDs.

[0089] Source Specific Broadcast (SSB) can be enabled by specifying two VIDs per source node (W-VID and P-VID) per ring. Each node needs to both relay and take a copy of Working VIDs. Each node simply needs to connect Protection VIDs between ring ports. MAC learning is disabled on all VIDs.

[0090] FIGS. 7A and 7B illustrate another embodiment of the present invention. In this embodiment, the problem of time delays due to looped back traffic is addressed. In FIG. 7A, switching network 54 includes a source node 56, transit nodes 58, 60, and a destination node 62, along a primary path 64 of a 1:1 protected trunk. An alternate, secondary path 66 includes a transit node 68. Network 54 is not limited to a specific number of transit nodes. The primary and secondary legs of the 1:1 trunk can be thought of as forming a ring.

[0091] In one embodiment, source node 56 includes a network interface subsystem that includes the hardware and software necessary to allow source node 56 to interface with network 54 using a suitable protocol where communication with network 54 can occur through multiple physical interfaces. The network interface subsystem is arranged to transmit traffic, i.e. data packets to destination node 62 using the primary path 64 and the secondary path 66. The secondary path 66 is used when the primary path 64 fails. Source node 56 also includes a processor in communication with the network interface subsystem. The processor can be coupled to one or more memory elements through a system bus. The memory elements can include local memory employed during actual execution of program code, bulk storage, and cache memories which provide temporary storage of at least some program code in order to reduce the number of times code must be retrieved from bulk storage during execution. Input and output devices can be used to interface with the network either directly or via intervening I/O controllers.

[0092] One issue that can arise is the increased delay incurred by traffic which is transmitted by source node 56 and, due to a failure 70 along primary path 64, is looped back and returned to source node 56. This can be referred to as a loopback condition. Further, any traffic that is transmitted from destination node 62 toward source node 56 via transit nodes 58, 60 is also returned to node 62 due to the failure 70 occurring on primary path 70, between transit nodes 58 and 60. Network 54 can incur a delay time equal to the time it takes for the traffic to travel to the point of failure 70 and back to originating nodes 56 and 62. In this example, a failure 70 has occurred on primary path 64 between transit nodes 58 and 60.

[0093] One approach to resolve the increased delay due to looped back traffic is the use of slow Continuity Check Messages (CCMs) between source node 56 and destination node 62. By transmitting slow CCMs and ensuring that the CCMs are not looped back to their respective originating nodes (source node 56 and destination node 62), the source node 56 and destination node 62 can detect a loss of CCMs and can stop sending traffic onto primary path 64 and start sending traffic onto the secondary path 66.

[0094] Another approach to resolve the increased delay is the use of slow alarm indication signals (AISs). When a failure is detected by a transit node, e.g. transit node 58, the traffic is looped back to its originating node. However, in addition to the looped back traffic, an AIS is sent from transit node 58 to the originating node. This AIS alerts both the source node 56 and the destination node 62 to stop transmitting along primary path 64 and to start sending traffic onto secondary path 66.

[0095] Still another approach to resolve the increased delay due to looped back traffic is to provide source node 56 and destination node 62 with the ability to detect when traffic is looped back and to then stop transmitting traffic along the primary path 64 and start transmitting to the secondary path 66. By utilizing one of the aforementioned approaches, traffic need no longer be looped back to source node 56 or destination node 62 upon the occurrence of a fault 70 on the primary path 64. Instead, as shown in FIG. 7B, traffic can be diverted to the fault-free secondary path 66.

[0096] When a failure actually occurs, all traffic on the failed link. i.e. primary path 64, is essentially lost. Further, when source node 56 and destination node 62 begin transmitting onto the secondary path 66, all traffic in-transit along the primary path 64 is also essentially lost. One way to avoid this “dual” traffic hit is by having a source node 56 and a destination node 62 with the capability to buffer traffic such that all new traffic is buffered until the in-transit traffic is drained from primary path 64. After such in-transit traffic is drained, source node 52 and destination node 62 start transmitting the buffered traffic onto the secondary path 66. The processor of source node 56 and destination node 62 can be adapted to detect the loopback condition described above and halt transmission of the packets to the other end node via the primary path upon detection of a loopback condition. The processor, upon detection of the loopback condition can then operate to transmit the packets toward the other end node on the secondary path. A loopback condition can be detected by looking at the SA MAC address. That is, when a packet is received with an SA MAC address equal to the MAC address being inserted by this node in the SA frame location then the packet is a loopback packet.

[0097] The processor can receive from a transit node an alarm indication signal (AIS) indicating the occurrence of a failure on the primary path, whereby the processor halts transmission of the packets on the primary path and switches transmission of packets to the secondary path upon receipt of the AIS.

[0098] The processor is further adapted to wait until all transmitted packets have been looped back and transmitted on the secondary path before starting transmission of new packets on the secondary path. This entails buffering all new packets and transmitting them only after the last looped back packet is transmitted on the secondary path.

[0099] While certain features of the embodiments have been illustrated as described herein, many modifications, substitutions, changes and equivalents will now occur to those skilled in the art. It is therefore to be understood that the appended claims are intended to cover all such modifications and changes as fall within the true spirit of the

[0100] It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that the present invention is not limited to what has been particularly shown and described herein above. In addition, unless mention was made above to the contrary, it should be noted that all of the accompanying drawings are not to scale. A variety of modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teachings without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention, which is limited only by the following claims.