Systems and methods for determining network topologies

• Main Authors: HERSEY DANIEL C, RAMASUBRAMANIAN SRINIVASAN, APPENZELLER GUIDO, DHAMI MANDEEP SINGH, ZHOU SHUDONG
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 21.06.2016
• Subjects: ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE; ELECTRICITY; TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHICCOMMUNICATION

A controller may control client switches in a network including client and non-client switches. The controller may maintain a link discovery table including entries that identify links between client switches. The controller may classify the links as direct or broadcast links. To classify links of the link discovery table, the controller may direct client switches to send broadcast and directed discovery packets from switch ports. Client switches that receive the discovery packets from other client switches may forward the discovery packets to the controller. The controller may use the discovery packets to classify the links of the link discovery table. The controller may classify ports as broadcast or regular ports based on the classified links. Non-client broadcast domains of the network topology may be identified from the broadcast ports using the broadcast and direct links of the link discovery table.