Patent ID: 9300528
Filing Date: 2016-03-29
CPC Classification: H04L

Claim Text:
1. A system for providing multipath connectivity between layers in a communication protocol, the system comprising: a plurality of computing devices implementing transparent interconnection of lots of links (TRILL) network connectivity at layer three; a multilevel network comprising a first network layer that includes a plurality of leaf switches, the multi-level network configured for providing local network access among the computing devices and a second network layer that includes a plurality of spine switches that provide access to the computing devices; and a plurality of inter-layer links that are configured for connecting each leaf switch to a plurality of the spine switches to provide multiple inter-layer communication paths between the leaf and spine switches, wherein all of the spine switches are assigned a common Internet protocol (IP) and media access control (MAC) address, and are thus associated with a common network gateway; wherein each leaf switch comprises an inter-layer link selection protocol that is configured for selectively connecting only one active inter-layer link between the leaf switch and the spine switch while disabling all other available inter-layer links between the leaf switch and the spine switch; wherein, in response to detecting a failure of an active inter-layer link, each leaf switch is configured to activate an alternative inter-layer link between the leaf switch and the spine switch while disabling all other available inter-layer links between the leaf switch and the spine switches without reconfiguring the leaf switch with a new address for the alternate inter-layer link or relying on multipath functionality implanted within the spine switch.