Granted Patent B1

US 12,418,480 · App. 18/456,686 · Granted Sep 16, 2025

Inventors: Yimin Shen (Sherborn, MA); Zhaohui Zhang (Westford, MA); Alexander Arseniev (Ras al Khaimah, AE); Ronald Bonica (Sterling, VA)

Assignee: Juniper Networks, Inc.

H04L45/566H04L45/16H04L45/50H04L69/22H04L2101/659

Abstract

Claims (77)

1. A method, comprising:

receiving, by a network node, a packet that originated from another network node;

determining, by the network node and based on segment identifier (SID) information associated with the packet, that the network node is a transit leaf node in a point-to-multipoint transport chain,

wherein the network node does not maintain one or more of state information or session information when the point-to-multipoint transport chain is created or modified;

generating, by the network node and based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, a copy of the packet;

updating, by the network node and based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, the SID information; and

sending, by the network node and based on the updated SID information, the packet, with the updated SID information, to a destination network node.

2. The method of claim 1 , comprising:

receiving, by the network node, a second packet;

processing, by the network node, the second packet to determine SID information associated with a second point-to-multipoint transport chain;

determining, by the network node and based on the SID information associated with the second point-to-multipoint transport chain, that the network node is a tail-end leaf node in the second point-to-multipoint transport chain; and

processing, by the network node, the second packet to perform one or more additional actions.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

creating a copy of the packet; and

processing the copy of the packet to perform one or more actions.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein determining that the network node is the transit leaf node comprises:

determining that an active SID of the SID information matches a SID associated with the network node;

determining that the SID information includes at least one additional SID; and

determining that the network node is the transit leaf node based on determining that the SID information includes at least one additional SID.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein updating the SID information comprises:

generating a copy of the packet;

identifying SID information included in a header of the copy of the packet; and

removing the SID information from the header of the copy of the packet because the copy of the packet is not to be forwarded by the network node.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein receiving the packet that originated from another network node comprises:

receiving the packet from an originating root network node.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the network node is configured to handle different types of segment routing packets when the network node is part of a different point-to-multipoint transport chain.

8. A network node, comprising:

one or more processors to:

determine, based on segment identifier (SID) information associated with a packet, that the network node is a transit leaf node in a point-to-multipoint transport chain,

wherein the network node is configured to handle different types of segment routing packets when the network node is part of a different point-to-multipoint transport chain;

generate, based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, a copy of the packet;

update, based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, the SID information; and

send, based on the updated SID information, the packet, with the updated SID information, to another network node.

9. The network node of claim 8 , wherein the SID indicates one or more of:

an interface of the network node, or

an address of the network node.

10. The network node of claim 8 , wherein the one or more processors are to perform one or more of:

cause a firewall setting of the network node to be adjusted,

cause a transmission setting of the network node to be adjusted,

cause information included in a payload of the packet to be stored in a data structure of the network node, or

cause information included in a payload of the packet to be stored in a data structure accessible to the network node.

11. The network node of claim 8 , wherein the one or more processors, to update the SID information, are to:

remove an active SID from the SID information to cause the SID information to indicate a new active SID.

12. The network node of claim 8 , wherein the one or more processors are further to:

receive the packet that originated from a root network node,

wherein the packet is an ingress packet from an endpoint device that is a source for network traffic.

13. The network node of claim 8 , wherein the one or more processors are further to:

generate a copy of the packet based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain; and

process the copy of the packet to perform one or more actions.

14. The network node of claim 8 , wherein the network node does not maintain one or more of a state information or session information when the point-to-multipoint transport chain is created or modified.

15. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions, the instructions comprising:

one or more instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of network node, cause the one or more processors to:

receive a packet that originated from a root network node;

determine, based on segment identifier (SID) information associated with a packet, that the network node is a transit leaf node in a point-to-multipoint transport chain,

wherein the network node is configured to handle different types of segment routing packets;

generate, based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, a copy of the packet;

update, based on determining that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, the SID information; and

send, based on the updated SID information, the packet, with the updated SID information, to another network node.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the SID indicates a preferred path, wherein the preferred path is one or more of:

a shortest path, or

a path with a preferred amount of hops from a particular network node to the network node.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the one or more instructions cause the one or more processors to:

remove the SID information from the packet; and

process, after removing the SID information from the packet, the packet to perform one or more actions.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the one or more instructions cause the one or more processors to:

determine that an active SID of the SID information matches a SID associated with the network node;

determine, based on determining that the active SID of the SID information matches the SID associated with the network node, that the SID information does not include any additional SIDs; and

determine, based on determining that the SID information does not include any additional SIDs, that the network node is a tail-end leaf node.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the one or more instructions cause the one or more processors to:

process the packet to perform one or more of:

cause one or more settings of the network node to be adjusted,

cause information included in the packet to be saved in a data structure, or

generate an additional packet and send the additional packet to another network node.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the one or more instructions, that cause the one or more processors to determine that the network node is the transit leaf node in the point-to-multipoint transport chain, cause the one or more processors to:

determine that an active SID of the SID information matches a SID associated with the network node;

determine, based on determining that the active SID of the SID information matches the SID associated with the network node, that the SID information includes at least one additional SID; and

determine, based on determining that the SID information includes at least one additional SID, that the network node is the transit leaf node.

Assignments (1)

Continuity (2)

References Cited (15)