Network Packet Trace Slicing for Virtual Switch Monitoring
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Traditional network monitoring mechanisms are fragmented and lack granularity, making it difficult to diagnose issues effectively in virtualized networks, particularly in Open vSwitch environments, where clear visibility and troubleshooting capabilities are essential to prevent business impact.
Innovation Solution
A computer-implemented method for network monitoring that includes trace slicing to organize packet events into path-based trace slices, characterization to extract feature matrices, and analysis to cluster, rank, and query packet traces, enabling diagnosing data-path routing problems and providing new network visualization and traffic analysis.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If traditional centralized monitoring mechanisms are used, then network monitoring coverage is provided, but measurement precision and granularity are insufficient for effective issue diagnosis
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments network packet traces by organizing them into path-based trace slices, where each slice represents a specific network path. This segmentation transforms the monolithic trace data into manageable, path-specific units that can be analyzed independently, thereby improving measurement precision without proportionally increasing system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a new dimension of organization by creating path-based trace slices from traditional flat packet traces. This dimensional transformation adds path context to the data structure, enabling more precise measurement and analysis of network issues along specific paths without requiring a complete redesign of the monitoring system.
2Reliability
If detailed packet trace analysis is performed, then diagnostic capability is improved, but loss of time for processing and analyzing increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent performs preliminary organization of packet traces into path-based slices before analysis occurs. By pre-organizing the data structure according to network paths, the system eliminates the need for complex runtime analysis to determine packet paths, thereby reducing diagnosis time while maintaining comprehensive troubleshooting capability.
Solution Approach 2:
By segmenting traces into path-specific slices, the patent enables parallel processing of multiple path analyses simultaneously. This segmentation reduces the overall time required for comprehensive network diagnosis compared to analyzing all packets sequentially in a monolithic structure.
3Loss of information
If comprehensive network visibility is achieved through detailed tracing, then understanding of network performance is improved, but device complexity and processing overhead increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments comprehensive network trace data into path-based slices, maintaining full visibility of network performance while organizing data into manageable units. Each slice contains only the packets relevant to a specific path, reducing processing complexity compared to analyzing all packets together while preserving complete network visibility across all paths.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent extracts path-specific information from comprehensive packet traces by creating separate trace slices for each network path. This extraction process isolates relevant data for each path, reducing the complexity of processing comprehensive network data while maintaining complete visibility of network performance across all paths.
Data Source
Figure 1~4
Figure 3A~3B
Figure 5~6
AI summary
A computer implemented method for network monitoring includes providing network packet event characterization and analysis for network monitoring that includes supporting summarization and characterization of network packet traces collected across multiple processing elements of different types in a virtual network, including a trace slicing to organize individual packet events into path-based trace slices, a trace characterization to extract at least 2 types of feature matrix describing those trace slices, and a trace analysis to cluster, rank and query packet traces based on metrics of the feature matrix.