Patent ID: 8611347

Claim:
A method comprising: storing configuration data within a network device that switches layer two (L2) communications between local attachment circuits hosted by the network device and a plurality of pseudowires that connect the network device to a plurality of remote network devices of a L2 virtual private network (VPN), wherein the L2 VPN provides point-to-multipoint (P2MP) connectivity between a plurality of customer devices, the plurality of customer devices including one or more root customer devices permitted to communicate with any of the customer devices and further including one or more leaf customer devices permitted to communicate with only the root customer devices, wherein the configuration data classifies each local attachment circuit of the network device as either a root attachment circuit that couples the network device to one of the root customer devices or a leaf attachment circuit that couples the network device to one of the leaf customer devices, and wherein the configuration data identifies each of the remote network devices as hosting only leaf attachment circuits that couple the remote network device to one or more of the leaf customer devices or hosting at least one root attachment circuit that couples the remote network device to one of the root customer devices; assigning the local attachment circuits of the network device and the pseudowires to a plurality of mesh groups for the L2 VPN based on the configuration data; and switching the L2 communications between the attachment circuits of the network device and the pseudowires based on the mesh groups to constrain the L2 VPN to the point-to multipoint (P2MP) connectivity.