Methods and apparatus for assigning same sequence number to multiple GTP messages

1. A method for providing sequence numbers, comprising:

generating a global index pool containing a plurality of indexes, wherein generating a global index pool further includes configuring each index to a 19-bit wide index in the global index pool and providing the global index pool containing equal to or greater than 500,000 indexes;

generating a plurality of non-standard ports for a network device, wherein generating a plurality of non-standard ports includes providing eight (8) non-standard ports for a gateway GPRS support node (“GGSN”);

providing a first sequence number (“SN”) for a general packet radio service tunneling protocol (“GTP”) message which is used for communication between peers, wherein providing a first SN further includes providing a 16-bit SN for the GTP message which can be sent from the GGSN to a serving GPRS support node (“SGSN”);

storing the first SN in a first field of a first index of the plurality of indexes, wherein storing the first SN includes inserting a 16-bit SN in upper portion of a 19-bit index and a 3-bit first socket address in lower portion of the 19-bit index; and

inserting a first socket address of the plurality of non-standard ports in a second field of the first index of the plurality of indexes.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

fetching an index from a global index pool upon a request of new SN; and

obtaining a SN from a SN field of the index.

3. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:

assigning the SN to a GTP message for a peer communication; and

identifying a non-standard port in response to a socket address obtained from the second field of the index.

4. The method of claim 3 , further comprising sending the GTP message from the GGSN to SGSN.

5. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:

providing a second SN;

storing the second SN in a first field of a second index of the plurality of indexes; and

inserting a second socket address of the plurality of non-standard ports in the second field of the second index of the plurality of indexes.

6. A method for assigning a sequence number, comprising:

fetching an index from a global index pool, wherein fetching an index includes obtaining a 19-bit index from a global index pool containing at least 500,000 indexes;

obtaining a sequence number (“SN”) from a SN field of the index, wherein obtaining a SN includes extracting a 16-bit SN from a 19-bit field of the index;

assigning the SN to a general packet radio service tunneling protocol (“GTP”) message for peer communication;

identifying a non-standard port in accordance with a value in a socket field of the index, wherein identifying a non-standard port includes determining a non-standard port in the GGSN in response to a non-standard port index fetched from a 3-bit socket field in the 19-bit index; and

sending the GTP message from the non-standard port.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein assigning the SN to a GTP message for peer communication includes inserting a 16-bit SN to a GTP version 2 (“GTPv2”) between a gateway GPRS support node (“GGSN”) and SGSN.

8. The method of claim 6 , wherein assigning the SN to a GTP message for peer to peer communication includes inserting a 16-bit SN to a GTP version 1 (“GTPv1”) between a gateway GPRS support node (“GGSN”) and a serving GPRS support node (“SGSN”).

9. The method of claim 6 , wherein sending the GTP message from the non-standard port further includes forwarding a locally initiated GTP-C message from GGSN to a serving GPRS support node (“SGSN”).

10. A network device, comprising:

a plurality of non-standard ports able to initiate locally created general packet radio service tunneling protocol (“GTP”) message for peer communication, wherein the plurality of non-standard ports includes at least eight (8) non-standard ports for a gateway GPRS support node (“GGSN”); and

a global index pool coupled to the plurality of non-standard ports, and configured to include a plurality of indexes, wherein each of the plurality of indexes includes a sequence number (“SN”) field and a non-standard port field, wherein the SN field contains a SN and the non-standard port field contains a socket number indicating a specific non-standard port,

wherein a first SN is configured to be a 16-bit SN for the GTP message which can be sent from the GGSN to a serving GPRS support node (“SGSN”),

wherein the global index pool contains at least 500,000 indexes wherein each of the indexes is configured to be a 19-bit wide index, wherein upper portion of the 19-bit index contains a 16-bit SN and lower portion of the 19-bit index contains a 3-bit first socket address.

11. The device of claim 10 , wherein the plurality of non-standard ports are non-standard user datagram protocol (“UDP”) source ports capable of sending locally generated messages from a gateway GPRS support node (“GGSN”) to a serving GPRS support node (“SGSN”).

12. The device of claim 10 , wherein the global index pool includes 500,000 entries.

13. The device of claim 10 , wherein the SN field is a 16-bit field and non-standard port field is a 3-bit field.