Patent ID: 11882015
Assignee: NIPPON TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE CORPORATION
Field: Digital communication (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC H

Claim 0:
1. An estimation system for determining a topology between a plurality of interfaces of a first network device of at least two network devices and a plurality of interfaces of a set of second network devices of the at least two network devices that are connected to each other, comprising:
an addition device comprising:
a storage configured to:
store address information of (i) the plurality of interfaces of the first network device and (ii) the plurality of interfaces of the second network device,

a processor configured to:
determine that the first network device is to be a destination of a plurality of packets to be transmitted from the at least two network devices based on the first network device being a server-side network device and the second network device being a client-side network device, and
generate the plurality of packets, wherein each of the plurality of packets has a different data amount, and

a transmitter configured to:
transmit the plurality of packets to the plurality of interfaces of the first network device, respectively, at different times, by using address information of the plurality of interfaces read from the storage, such that each interface of the plurality of interfaces receives at least one of the plurality of packets;

the first network device comprising:
at least one transmitter configured to:
receive the plurality of packets and output each of the plurality of packets using the interface that received the packet toward the second network device using the plurality of interfaces, and
receive responses for each of the plurality of packets and forward the plurality of responses to a collection device;

the set of second network devices comprising:
at least one transmitter configured to:
receive the plurality of packets from the first network device and responding using a same one of the plurality of interfaces of the set of second devices;

the collection device, comprising:
at least one processor configured to:
store data of the plurality of responses, and

a transmitter configured to:
transmit the stored data to an estimation device; and

an estimation device comprising:
one or more processors configured to:
based on the stored data, for each individual packet of the plurality of packets:
compare data amounts of each interface of the first network device that includes a data amount of the individual packet and a data amount of each interface of the set of second network device that includes tha data amount of the individual packet, and
calculate, based on the comparison, a combination of the interfaces of the first network device and the set of second network devices that includes the data amount of the packet to determine connection relationships between the interfaces.