Patent ID: 8238343

Claim:
A method of performing tunnel signaling over an IP tunneling path, the method comprising: transmitting an end-to-end signaling flow including a session identifier and a binding data object storing first binding information for an end-to-end session associated with the end-to-end signaling flow through an end-to-end path connected to an IP tunneling path, wherein the first binding information comprises a binding type value indicating a binding type of the end-to-end session; generating a tunnel signaling flow including a tunnel flow identifier and a second binding data object storing second binding information for a tunnel session associated with the tunnel signaling flow corresponding to the end-to-end signaling flow, wherein the second binding information comprises a binding type value indicating a binding type of the tunnel session; and transmitting the generated tunnel signaling flow through the IP tunneling path; wherein the end-to-end signaling flow is separated from the tunnel signaling flow by distinguishing the session identifier from the tunnel flow identifier; and the binding type value of the first binding information and the binding type value of the second binding information are stored to process various types of session bindings using a single binding data object.