5G NF Discovery Fallback During NRF Outage
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Solution Overview
Problem
Service interruptions occur in 5G networks due to Network Repository Function (NRF) outages or Service Communication Proxy (SCP) failures during NF-NF communications, leading to inefficiencies in service discovery and communication.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a system where computing nodes store local discovery records and switch to these records when NRF or SCP becomes unavailable, allowing them to directly communicate with previously discovered network functions without repeatedly attempting discovery procedures.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the system continuously attempts discovery procedures when NRF is unavailable, then service continuity is maintained through active discovery, but network bandwidth and processing resources are wasted due to repeated failed discovery attempts
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs discovery procedures in advance and stores the results locally before NRF becomes unavailable. When NRF is down, the consumer NF instance uses these pre-stored discovery results to maintain service continuity without needing to perform new discovery procedures, thus avoiding repeated failed attempts and resource waste.
2Loss of energy
If the consumer NF instance uses locally stored discovery records when NRF is unavailable, then resource wastage is prevented and service continuity is maintained, but the system requires additional local memory storage capacity
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts and stores only the essential discovery results (producer NF instance information) locally in the consumer NF instance, rather than storing complete NF profiles or unnecessary data. This minimizes the local storage requirement while still enabling service continuity during NRF outages.
3Reliability
If the system implements fallback to locally stored discovery records, then service interruption is avoided during NRF outage, but the complexity of the discovery mechanism increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs discovery procedures in advance and stores the results locally before NRF becomes unavailable. When NRF is down, the consumer NF instance uses these pre-stored discovery results to maintain service continuity without needing to perform new discovery procedures, thus avoiding repeated failed attempts and resource waste.
Data Source
AI summary
In response to determining that a first computing node is to consume a service provided by a target network function associated with a 5G core network, it is determined whether the NRF is available to process a request from the first computing node to perform a discovery procedure to determine a computing node that implements the target network function. When the NRF is unavailable, the first computing node searches discovery records of previous discovery procedures performed by the first computing node and identifies a second computing node that implements the target network function. The first computing node transmits a service request to the identified second computing node.