An apparatus for improving data transfer speed by using Multipath Transport Control Protocol (MPTCP) and Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) combination, wherein the apparatus comprises a user interface module called Application Management System (AMS) module (100) to receive user inputs for managing transport protocol (MPTCP or conventional TCP/UDP/SCTP) usage selection. The apparatus also includes a Selection, Inspection Control (SIC) middleware module (101) which STARTs and STOPs the corresponding MPTCP module or conventional TCP/UDP/SCTP module based on the user inputs received from AMS. The MPTCP module splits the data traffic into multiple TCP subflows and sends the subflows via wired network interface (104), wherein each network interface is connected to one MIMO systems (107) for achieving efficient data transfer.

A method, operational at a network device, for conveying congestion information across different strata of a multi-strata network is provided. An indication is obtained that a congestion level for at least one of a radio access network node and a core network node of a network has changed. Consequently, a one or more service parameters for a plurality of services, operating at a service stratum, are updated or adjusted on a per service basis based on the congestion level indication. The one or more service parameters are provided or sent to, at least one of, a node operating at a service stratum or a user device that obtains services over the network.

A method is provided in one example embodiment and includes calculating a packet metric for a first one of a plurality of links connected to a network element, wherein the packet metric is equal to a packet count over a period of time T divided by a maximum throughput of the first one of the links; and determining based on the packet metric whether traffic on the one of the links should be switched to another one of the plurality of links to optimize power usage. If a determination is made that the traffic on the first one of the links should be switched to another one of the plurality of links, the method further includes selecting a second link from a subset of the plurality of links; assigning the traffic to the selected second link; and applying a cost saving measure at an interface of the network element to which the first link is connected.

A computer-implemented method includes: monitoring, by a computing device, respective locations of a plurality of user devices; determining, by the computing device, that a particular group of user devices of the plurality of user devices are located within a threshold distance of each other based on monitoring the respective locations of the plurality of user devices; and storing or outputting, by the computing device, grouping information indicating that the particular group of user devices are associated with a single user based on the determining that the particular group of user devices are located within a threshold distance of each other.

A SDN controller receives a packet related to flow which is uploaded from a vSwitch, and if source address and destination address of the packet related to flow belong to different physical servers, the SDN controller may distribute a source flow table entry to the vSwitch which uploads the packet related to flow. Wherein action corresponding to the source flow table entry may include: for a traffic packet whose destination address matches the destination address, by using MAC address of a vSwitch connected with the source address as outer layer source MAC address and using MAC address of a vSwitch connected with the destination address as outer layer destination MAC address, encapsulating the traffic packet into a packet having double layer VLAN tags, and forwarding the packet from a port leading to a physical network card of the physical server where the vSwitch is deployed.

A kind of congestion improvement method based on the QUIC protocol adds the information of round trip delay in the congestion algorithm, self-adaptive changes the value of α to judge the situation of current network through comparison between the RTT of last time and the current RTT and then adjusts the current target window value in accordance with the current network situation, changing the congestion window based on the cubic growth curve of the cubic algorithm. This improvement method can make the QUIC protocol judge the current network situation more timely and accurately and can make the congestion window change quickly to fully utilize the bandwidth. The maximum congestion window limitation 200 exists in the QUIC protocol, which will not exceed 200 no matter how the congestion window grows. Such limitation largely reduces the throughput rate of QUIC protocol in the network environment with high bandwidth and long round trip delay.

A method and application function for managing data flows in a network comprising a plurality of nodes. The method comprises generating a number N of network load representatives (NLRs) of an expected loading of the network, identifying a path selection configuration for the data flows for each of the N NLRs and mapping a prevailing network loading to a selected one of the N NLRs. If the selected NLR is different from a currently selected NLR, the method triggers traffic engineering (TE) by implementing the path selection configuration of the selected NLR at nodes affected thereby. The application function may comprise an NLR generator, a path optimizer and an NLR mapper.

Provided is a distributed service function (SF) forwarding system that applies the corresponding service function chain (SFC) to traffic classified by a plurality of service network (SN) controller instances based on an SN overlay structure. Therefore, by selectively combining and executing necessary network functions (SFs) according to a path and traffic made up of defined component services, it is possible to dynamically configure and control one network service.

An example method is provided for a computing device to perform traffic handling for a container in a virtualized computing environment. The method may comprise receiving a traffic flow of packets from a virtual machine and identifying a container from which the traffic flow originates based on content of the received traffic flow of packets. The container may be supported by the virtual machine. The method may further comprise retrieving a policy configured for the identified container and handling the received traffic flow of packets according to the policy.

In one embodiment, a method includes computing at a controller, a primary path and a backup path for transmittal of multicast data from service nodes in communication with the controller and a multicast source to access nodes in communication with multicast receivers, and transmitting from the controller, information for the primary path and the backup path to the access nodes for use by the access nodes in receiving the multicast data on the primary path and the backup path, and switching transmittal of the multicast data to the multicast receivers from the primary path to the backup path upon identifying a failure in the primary path to provide fast reroute at the access nodes. A multicast control plane runs in the controller without operating in the access nodes. An apparatus is also disclosed herein.