Routing methods, systems, and computer program products
Patent No. US10805204 (titled "Routing methods, systems, and computer program products") on Feb 20, 2020. The application was issued on Oct 13, 2020.
What is this patent about?
’204 is related to the field of network routing and packet forwarding, specifically within large-scale, subdivided networks that utilize segment routing architectures. It addresses the complexities of managing traffic paths across multiple network domains or areas by leveraging centralized control to coordinate how data traverses from one access network to another through a core infrastructure.
The underlying idea behind ’204 is the use of a centralized controller to provide specific path instructions to ingress nodes in the form of a segment identifier data structure. By offloading the path calculation to a central authority, individual nodes do not need to maintain exhaustive global topology maps; instead, they receive a pre-computed stack of identifiers that explicitly defines the route through various network subdivisions to a remote destination.
The claims of ’204 focus on a method and apparatus for receiving a data packet at a node within a first segment routing enabled access network and obtaining a remote segment identifier stack from a centralized controller. This stack encodes the specific path from an area edge node to a second access network, allowing the ingress node to encapsulate the packet with a full identifier stack before forwarding it toward the core network edge.
In practice, the invention functions by intercepting a packet at the network edge and querying a controller for the necessary routing instructions to reach a destination in a different subdivision. The node then applies packet encapsulation, attaching a sequence of segment identifiers that act as a source-routed roadmap. This allows the packet to be steered through the subdivided network without requiring each intermediate hop to perform a traditional destination-based lookup.
This approach differs from prior solutions by replacing decentralized, hop-by-hop routing protocols with a centralized path encoding mechanism that simplifies the internal logic of area nodes. By using a subdivided network model and a remote identifier stack, the system reduces the overhead associated with maintaining massive routing tables in large-scale environments while ensuring precise control over the end-to-end data path.
How does this patent fit in bigger picture?
Technical Landscape
In the early 2010s when ’204 was filed, network engineering was characterized by a rigid distinction between a node's identity and the path used to reach it, at a time when routing was typically implemented using global IP address spaces and hop-by-hop lookup tables. Systems commonly relied on standardized 32-bit or 128-bit fixed-length addressing schemes where the address indicated a location rather than a specific topological route. Hardware and software constraints of this era made the dynamic encoding of path information directly into protocol addresses non-trivial, as routers were optimized for searching large, centralized routing tables rather than processing source-defined or nested path identifiers.
Prosecution Position
The disclosed invention represents a meaningful technical advancement by shifting from traditional location-based addressing to a path-based routing architecture. This is achieved through the integration of a centralized controller that provides segment identifier data structures to nodes within subdivided access networks, effectively encoding the specific network path from an entry edge node to a destination access network. By encapsulating data packets with these segment identifier stacks, the system overcomes the technical constraints of traditional hop-by-hop routing table exhaustion and latency. This architectural shift enables more granular control over traffic engineering and simplifies the routing logic required at intermediate nodes by embedding the route directly within the packet's protocol structure.
Claims
This patent contains 20 total claims, with claims 1, 9, and 15 serving as the independent claims. The independent claims focus on a method, a network device, and a computer-readable medium for managing data traffic across subdivided segment routing networks by receiving a remote segment identifier stack from a centralized controller and encapsulating packets to reach destinations in secondary access networks. The dependent claims serve to further specify the communication process by detailing the request for the identifier stack, the inclusion of specific destination information, and the addition of area-segment or nodal identifiers to the stack.
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US10805204
- Application Number
- US16796937A
- Filing Date
- Feb 20, 2020
- Publication Date
- Oct 13, 2020
- External Links
- Slate, USPTO , Google Patents