A system for efficient routing of an (OAM) frame in an Ethernet switch receives an OAM frame at a first port; building a first classification key dependent on an OAM frame header; classifies in a context of the first port to create a first classification; resolves action dependent on the first classification; modifies the first classification key to create a second classification key; classifies the frame in a context of the second port to create a second classification; sends the second classification key to an OAM engine coupled to the Ethernet switch for modification into a third classification key; receives the third classification key from the OAM engine; modifies the third classification key into a final classification key; modifies the header of the OAM frame with the final classification key; and sends the modified OAM frame to a switching fabric of the Ethernet switch.

In one embodiment, a time period is identified in which probe packets are to be sent along a path in a network based on predicted user traffic along the path. The probe packets are then sent during the identified time period along the path. Conditions of the network path are monitored during the time period. The rate at which the packets are sent during the time period is dynamically adjusted based on the monitored conditions. Results of the monitored conditions are collected, to determine an available bandwidth limit along the path.

An apparatus is described. The apparatus includes electronic circuitry to support multiple flows within a network. The electronic circuitry to determine respective telemetry information for the multiple flows and inject an alarm message into a particular one of the multiple flows upon an alarm condition being reached for the particular one flow. The alarm message includes a multi-bit error code that describes the alarm condition. The multi-bit error code is one of multiple, possible multi-bit error codes.

A network device includes a rate measurement circuit that is configured to measure respective egress rates at which respective data is being transmitted via respective ports associated with the network device. A marking ratio determination circuit is configured to select respective marking ratios based on respective measured egress rates, the marking ratios for marking packets to be transmitted via the respective ports to indicate respective levels of congestion corresponding to the respective ports. Different marking ratios correspond to different measured egress rates. A packet editor circuit is configured to mark selected packets to be transmitted via respective ports according to the respective selected marking ratios. The respective selected marking ratios indicate to other communication devices that respective network paths via which the selected packets travelled experienced congestion, and the respective marking ratios indicate respective levels of congestion.

The invention relates to a method for detecting a multimedia communication problem. In one aspect, this is implemented by an execution entity, in a processing phase. A message(s) is received that belongs to at least one stream to be monitored relating to at least one media stream. A correspondence between the received message(s) and rule(s) associated with a stream(s) to be monitored is verified. If verified an error detection massage is sent to a checking entity separate from the execution entity, via a rule management entity.

A system for congestion control using a flow level transmit mechanism is disclosed. In some embodiments, the system comprises a source SFA and a receive SFA. The source SFA is configured to detect and classify a congestion notification packet (CNP) generated based on congestion in a network; select a receive block from a plurality of receive blocks based on the CNP; forward the CNP to a dedicated congestion notification queue of the receive block; identify a transmit queue from a plurality of transmit blocks based on processing the congestion notification queue, wherein the transmit queue originated a particular transmit flow causing the congestion; and stop the transmit queue.

This application describes a congestion control method and apparatus. In this application, a network device obtains time information of one or more congestion packets in a sent first data stream, where the one or more congestion packet carries a flag indicating a congestion notification. When the first data stream is congested, the network device obtains a first congestion notification packet based on the time information of the one or more congestion packets in the first data stream, where the first congestion notification packet notifies that a packet is congested beyond a first specified interval. The network device then sends the first congestion notification packet. According to the solutions in this application, a rate of a data stream can be prevented from being increased when the data stream is congested, and packet transmission efficiency is improved.

Devices and techniques for reorder resilient transport are described herein. A device may store data packets in sequential positions of a flow queue in an order in which the data packets were received. The device may retrieve a first data packet from a first sequential position and a second data packet from a second sequential position that is next in sequence to the first sequential position in the flow queue. The device may store the first data packet and the second data packet in a buffer and refrain from providing the first data packet and the second data packet to upper layer circuitry if the packet order information for the first data packet and the second data packet indicate that the first data packet and the second data packet were received out of order. Other embodiments are also described.

A switch or network interface can detect congestion caused by a flow of packets. The switch or network interface can generate a congestion hint packet and send the congestion hint packet directly to a source transmitter of the flow of packets that caused the congestion. The congestion hint packet can include information that the source transmitter can use to determine a remedial action to attempt to alleviate or stop congestion at the switch or network interface. For example, the transmitter can reduce a transmit rate of the flow of packets and/or select another route for the flow of packets. Some or all switches or network interfaces between the source transmitter and a destination endpoint can employ flow differentiation whereby a queue is selected to accommodate for a flow's sensitivity to latency.

A method for controlling network congestion, including overlaying an overlay network packet header on an encapsulation outer layer of a transmit packet, where the overlay network packet header includes an outer Internet Protocol (IP) header, and an explicit congestion notification (ECN) identifier of an ECN is set in the outer IP header, decapsulating the overlay network packet header for an encapsulated reply packet, where an inner congestion identifier that is based on the ECN identifier is obtained from an IP header of the decapsulated reply packet through matching, and if the decapsulated reply packet is a User Datagram Protocol (UDP) packet, forwarding the UDP packet to a preset slow channel.