Techniques described herein provide for fast updating of a forwarding table in a single active multihoming configuration. A first network device that is not connected to an ethernet segment (ES), receives a plurality of ethernet segment (ES) routes (e.g., EVPN type-4 routes) from a plurality of network devices that are connected to a host via the ES. When connectivity is lost to the on a designated forwarded for the ES, t the first network device performed a designated forwarding election algorithm based on the plurality of the received ES routes, to identify that a second network device of the plurality of network devices is designated as a new forwarding device. The first network device modifies an entry in a forwarding table to indicate that the host is now reachable via the second network device.

A media access control (MAC) address sending method, apparatus, and system, and a related device are provided. The method is implemented by a first network device connected to a first virtual machine and a second virtual machine. The first network device obtains a MAC address of the first virtual machine; and when the first virtual machine and the second virtual machine have a same MAC address and are located in different virtual local area networks, sends a route to a second network device, where the route includes route information, and the route information includes the MAC address, first virtual local area network information of the first virtual machine, and second virtual local area network information of the second virtual machine. In this method, information about virtual machines having a same MAC address in different virtual local area networks is aggregated to one route.

Various embodiments providing for an indicator (termed the “Traffic Category Indicator,” TCI) to be encoded into packets, different values of which can be used, e.g., to distinguish Traffic Engineered (TE) packets and non-TE packets. In an example embodiment, the TCI can be used, e.g., to configure a network node to implement different packet queues, on each link, for TE packets and non-TE packets. In embodiments corresponding to the DiffServ TE paradigm, a node can be configured to implement different queues within each Forwarding Class for each link, said different queues distinguished by different respective TCI values. Example benefits of TCI include, but are not limited to fate separation of TE and non-TE packets in a node. The TCI concept can beneficially be applied to different packet-switching technologies supporting Source Routing, such as the IP, MPLS, Ethernet, etc.

Techniques are disclosed for avoiding sending network traffic through a backup network device when an active network device is operational. An example device is configured to receive a first address resolution protocol (ARP) request from an active network device and a second ARP request from a backup network device. The device is also configured to, in response to receiving the first ARP request and the second ARP request, send a first ARP response to the active network device.

Techniques are described for providing a scaled-out transport supported by interconnected data processing units (DPUs) that operates as a single system bus connection proxy for device-to-device communications within a data center. As one example, this disclosure describes techniques for providing a Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) proxy for device-to-device communications employing the PCIe standard. The disclosed techniques include adding PCIe proxy logic on top of a host unit of a DPU to expose a PCIe proxy model to application processors, storage devices, network interface controllers, field programmable gate arrays, or other PCIe endpoint devices. The PCIe proxy model may be implemented as a physically distributed Ethernet-based switch fabric with PCIe proxy logic at the edge and fronting the PCIe endpoint devices. The interconnected DPUs and the distributed Ethernet-based switch fabric together provide a reliable, low-latency, and scaled-out transport that operates as a PCIe proxy.

Various embodiments of the teachings herein include a network topology construction method. The method may include: acquiring a MAC address table of each port on each switch in a target network; determining a first connection relationship in the target network according to the MAC addresses of terminal devices in the target network included in each acquired MAC address table; determining at least one first port according to the first connection relationship in the target network; determining a second connection relationship in the target network according to the MAC addresses included in the MAC address table of each of the first ports in the target network; and determining a network topology of the target network according to the first connection relationship and the second connection relationship in the target network.

A switching system comprises a controlling switch and a plurality of port extenders. One of the port extenders includes: at least one upstream port; multiple downstream ports; and a forwarding engine. A forwarding database is populated with entries indicating associations between i) respective network addresses corresponding to devices coupled to downstream ports, and ii) respective local downstream ports. The forwarding database excludes entries corresponding to network addresses corresponding to devices coupled to the at least one upstream port. The forwarding engine is configured to: for a first packet received via one of the local downstream ports, and having a destination network address in the forwarding database, forward the first packet to a different local downstream port indicated by the forwarding database. For a second packet received via one of the local downstream ports, and having a destination network address not in the forwarding database, forward the second packet to the at least one upstream port.

Packets are routed in a data network comprising a wireless mesh network and a controller providing IPv6 management traffic to nodes of the wireless network. A monitor function and a route table manager are used to generate a route table relating IPv6 addresses to each of the nodes via a respective one of a plurality of POP nodes, by accessing a pre-configured topology file, determining the reachability of each of the plurality of POP nodes from the controller by periodically sending test messages from the monitor function to each POP and detecting acknowledgement of the test messages. If a POP node is not reachable, the route table is updated to relate the IPv6 subnet of the POP that is not reachable to the address of a POP node that is reachable. A Layer 2 network is used to direct the IPv6 management traffic according to the amended route table.

A method may include bridging in, via a fabric, a multicast data packet from a source device to a first edge device of a plurality of edge devices and flooding the multicast data packet to the plurality of edge devices within a mutual subnetwork of the fabric. The method further includes bridging out the multicast data packet from a second edge device of the plurality of edge devices to a receiving device. The source device and the receiving device are located within the mutual subnetwork.

A method by a wireless transmitting device is disclosed for indicating a partial traffic identifier (PTID) or an access category index (ACI) in a header compression element. The method includes generating a frame that includes the header compression element, wherein the header compression element includes a first subfield that is for indicating a PTID of a quality of service (QoS) data frame or an ACI of a QoS management frame and a second subfield indicating whether the first subfield indicates the PTID of the QoS data frame or the ACI of the QoS management frame. The method further includes transmitting the frame through a wireless medium.