Patent ID: 9602305
Date: 2017-03-21
CPC Classifications: H04L

Claim:
1. For a physical device separate from sources and destinations of packets in a network, a method for implementing a first virtual extensible local area network gateway at a first datacenter, the method comprising: receiving, from a physical host separate from the physical device implementing the first gateway, an Ethernet packet destined for a machine residing in a remote layer-2 network broadcast domain at a second, geographically remote datacenter that is different from a local layer-2 network broadcast domain in which the physical host resides at the first datacenter; determining a virtual extensible local area network identifier for the received Ethernet packet; encapsulating the Ethernet packet with the determined virtual extensible local area network identifier and an Internet Protocol (IP) header; and forwarding the encapsulated packet to an IP network to which the physical device implementing the first gateway connects, thereby allowing the packet to be transported to a second virtual extensible local area network gateway at the second datacenter via the IP network and allowing the remote layer-2 network broadcast domain at the second datacenter and the local layer-2 network broadcast domain at the first datacenter to be part of a common layer-2 broadcast domain.