Network Slice Redundancy via Shared Risk Group Isolation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing communication networks face challenges in providing robust network services due to the failure of physical equipment, as they lack effective redundancy mechanisms in virtualized environments, leading to potential service outages and reduced availability.
Innovation Solution
The method involves identifying shared risk groups among connectivity and computing resources, which are expected to be disabled by the same failure event, and allocating redundant functions to disjoint subsets of these resources, ensuring that network slices operate on separate sets of physical infrastructure with minimal common vulnerabilities, thereby providing higher availability and redundancy.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If network functions are instantiated on shared physical infrastructure to improve resource utilization, then productivity increases, but reliability decreases due to single points of failure
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the network infrastructure into distinct shared risk groups (SRGs), where each SRG represents a set of resources that share a common failure mode. By dividing the infrastructure into multiple SRGs and distributing network functions across different segments, the system achieves both high resource utilization and improved reliability through isolation of failure domains.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies local quality by assigning different reliability characteristics to different resource groups. Critical network functions are placed on resources with higher reliability ratings, while non-critical functions can tolerate lower reliability. This localized optimization allows the system to maximize overall productivity while maintaining required service availability levels.
2Loss of substance
If redundant network functions are deployed on the same physical infrastructure to reduce costs, then loss of substance decreases, but reliability worsens due to correlated failures
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the failure risk characteristics from the physical infrastructure and creates abstract shared risk group identifiers. By separating the logical redundancy requirements from the physical infrastructure details, the system can deploy redundant functions on the same physical infrastructure while ensuring they belong to different SRGs, thus maintaining failure independence with reduced infrastructure overhead.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces shared risk groups as an intermediary layer between the physical infrastructure and the network functions. This intermediary abstraction allows the system to manage redundancy efficiently by assigning functions to SRGs based on failure correlation, enabling cost-effective deployment while maintaining reliability through the mediating SRG structure.
3Adaptability or versatility
If network slicing is implemented to provide customized services, then adaptability increases, but device complexity increases due to resource management overhead
Solution Approach 1:
The patent creates a universal SRG management framework that serves multiple network slices simultaneously. The same SRG identification and assignment mechanisms are applied across different slices, allowing the system to provide customized services to multiple tenants while using a single, standardized resource management approach, thereby reducing overall complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent manages complexity by changing the parameter representation of resources - instead of managing individual resource assignments for each slice, the system transforms the problem into SRG-level assignment. This parameter transformation simplifies the management overhead while maintaining the ability to provide customized services through flexible slice-SRG mapping.
Data Source
AI summary
A method and apparatus for instantiating network slices using connectivity and computing resources, is provided. Information regarding connectivity and computing resources for supporting network slices is used to identify shared risk groups. Each shared risk group includes those resources expected to be disabled by a common failure event. A first set of functions, such as virtual network functions, belonging to a network slice, is instantiated on a first subset of the resources. The union of all shared risk groups which include at least one of the first subset of resources is disjoint from the union of all shared risk groups which include at least one of a second subset of resources. The second subset of resources is allocated for instantiating a second set of functions which are redundant with the first set of functions. As such, redundant network slices and/or functions thereof can be provided which are robust to failure.