Patent ID: 9497123
Filing Date: 2016-11-15
CPC Classification: H04L

Claim Text:
1. A method implemented in a network device coupled to a software-defined networking (SDN) system, wherein the SDN system contains a set of network devices forwarding traffic flows and a SDN controller managing the set of network devices, the method comprising: upon receiving a packet for load balancing among a plurality of servers, determining whether a matching entry for the packet in a server distribution table contains both a current and a new server selection; upon determining that the matching entry in the server distribution table contains both the current and new server selection, determining whether there is a matching entry for the packet in a transient flow table, wherein the transient flow table maintains server selections when at least one of the plurality of servers is reconfigured so that at least one of the traffic flows is to be load balanced from one server to another server; upon determining that there is no matching entry for the packet in the transient flow table, determining whether the packet is a first packet of a traffic flow; upon determining that the packet is the first packet of a traffic flow, forwarding the packet according to the new server selection of the matching entry in the server distribution table; and updating the transient flow table to add a matching entry for the traffic flow indicating the new server selection.