Adaptive routing in a box

1. A network box connected to an upper tier and to a lower tier of network switches in a communication network, the network box having a network box radix and comprising:

leaf switches having ingress ports and egress ports for providing uplinks and downlinks between the network box and the network switches of the upper and lower tiers;

spine switches configured to exchange packets with the leaf switches, the leaf switches and the spine switches having respective switch radices, wherein the network box radix exceeds each of the switch radices; and

first packet processing circuitry configured to adaptively route the packets from the leaf switches to the spine switches, each of the leaf switches having an instance of the first packet processing circuitry; and

second packet processing circuitry configured to:

(a) associate the packets with flows; and

(b) for each of the flows statically route the packets associated therewith from the spine switches to a respective predetermined leaf switch to exit the network box through a predetermined egress port of the predetermined leaf switch,

each of the spine switches having an instance of the second packet processing circuitry, wherein each instance of the second packet processing circuitry is configured to execute a same hash function on identical fields of the packets to identify the predetermined leaf switch and the predetermined egress port, at least a portion of the packets being routed through the egress ports of the leaf switches into the network switches of the upper tier via the uplinks.

2. The network box in accordance with claim 1 , wherein the second packet processing circuitry is configured for:

detecting a compromised ability of a congested spine switch to forward an arriving packet from another switch; and

issuing a rerouting notification from the congested spine switch.

3. The network box in accordance with claim 2 , wherein the rerouting notification is addressed individually to the other switch.

4. The network box in accordance with claim 2 , wherein the arriving packet belongs to a flow, and wherein the first packet processing circuitry is configured to respond to the rerouting notification by avoiding routing the arriving packet and subsequently arriving packets belonging to the flow through the congested spine switch.

5. The network box in accordance with claim 1 , further comprising a processor configured to transmit updated routing data to the spine switches and to synchronize a changeover to the updated routing data in the spine switches.

6. A method of communication comprising the steps of:

in a network box accepting packets from a network in ingress ports of a first tier of leaf switches, wherein the network box is connected by uplinks and downlinks to an upper tier and to a lower tier of network switches in a communications network;

adaptively routing the packets from the leaf switches to a second tier of spine switches within the network box, the leaf switches and spine switches having respective radices, wherein a radix of the network box exceeds each of the respective radices of the leaf switches and the spine switches;

associate the packets with flows;

for each of the flows statically routing the packets associated therewith from the spine switches to a predetermined one of the leaf switches by applying an identical hash function on identical fields of the packets in each of the spine switches to identify an egress port in in the predetermined one of the leaf switches; and

transmitting at least a portion of the packets through the identified egress port into the network switches of the upper tier via the uplinks.

7. The method in accordance with claim 6 , further comprising the steps of:

detecting a compromised ability of a congested spine switch to forward an arriving packet from another switch; and

sending a rerouting notification from the congested spine switch.

8. The method in accordance with claim 7 , further comprising addressing the rerouting notification individually to the other switch.

9. The method in accordance with claim 7 , wherein the arriving packet belongs to a flow, further comprising responding to the rerouting notification by avoiding routing the arriving packet and subsequently arriving packets belonging to the flow through the congested spine switch.

10. The method in accordance with claim 6 , further comprising the steps of:

transmitting updated routing data to the spine switches and;

synchronizing a changeover to the updated routing data in the spine switches.