Patent ID: 8549178

Claim:
A network comprising: a provider backbone bridged network (PBBN) that comprises a plurality of backbone core bridges (BCBs); a plurality of backbone edge bridges (BEBs) in the PBBN that are coupled to the BCBs; a plurality of customer bridges (CBs) coupled to the BEBs via a plurality of customer-virtual local area networks (C-VLANs), wherein at least some of the BCBs are configured to support customer-tagged (C-tagged) traffic, wherein each of the CBs are configured to support C-tagged traffic, wherein one of the BEBs is configured to: map one of the C-VLANs identified by a first Customer-tag (C-tag) within a C-tagged frame to a backbone-virtual local area network (B-VLAN) identified by a second C-tag within a second C-tagged frame; and add an encapsulated address type (EAT) EtherType field to the second C-tagged frame that excludes a Backbone Service Instance-tag (I-tag) for the second C-tagged frame, wherein the C-tagged frame is forwarded between one of the CBs and one of the BEBs using one of the C-VLANs, and wherein the second C-tagged frame is forwarded between one of the BCBs and one of the BEBs using the B-VLAN.