Tunnel Processing Device for Seamless Data Center Service Migration
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing solutions for migrating a service from an active data center to a standby data center, such as DNS and LISP, face limitations in scalability and cause service interruptions due to the need for re-establishing connection relationships and delays in updating routing information.
Innovation Solution
A method involving a tunnel processing device that receives a fault notification, disables the local tunnel entry, acquires and encapsulates service access requests with the new IP address of the standby data center, and sends them to the customer edge router, ensuring seamless migration without interrupting service access.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If DNS solution is used to detect and update virtual machine status in real time, then service continuity can be maintained, but the quantity of domain names that a DNS server can accommodate is limited and it does not have good expansibility
Solution Approach 1:
The system segments the service migration management by introducing multiple components including migration management module, migration execution module, and tunnel processing modules distributed across active and standby data centers. This segmentation allows the system to handle large numbers of services without overloading a single DNS server, thus improving scalability while maintaining service continuity through coordinated operation of distributed components.
2Reliability
If DNS solution updates IP address correspondence, then client can access new virtual machine, but the quintuple determining original TCP connection changes causing damage of connection relationship and service interruption
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by pre-establishing tunnel entries in the standby data center before actual service migration is needed. When migration is required, the tunnel processing module in the standby data center already has the necessary routing information prepared, enabling immediate service takeover without connection interruption. This eliminates service interruption time while maintaining accessibility.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces tunnel processing modules and encapsulation mechanisms as intermediaries between clients and virtual machines. These intermediaries handle the complexity of connection maintenance during migration by encapsulating packets and managing tunnel entries, thereby preserving TCP connection relationships (quintuple) while enabling seamless service migration without interruption.
3Speed
If LISP solution is used to distinguish routing locator and end-point identifier, then packet forwarding can be optimized, but after virtual machine migration the ingress tunnel router cannot be notified to quickly switch to new routing locator causing service interruption
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements feedback mechanisms where the migration execution module notifies the tunnel processing module of routing changes in real time. When a virtual machine migrates from active to standby data center, the migration execution module immediately updates the tunnel processing module, which then updates tunnel entries and notifies relevant routers. This feedback loop ensures rapid notification and switching without service interruption, maintaining high packet forwarding speed.
4Reliability
If virtual machine is migrated from active to standby data center, then disaster recovery capability is achieved, but the egress tunnel router needs to learn through listening before completing registration causing delay
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary registration actions by having the migration execution module proactively notify the egress tunnel router of routing changes before actual service traffic needs to be redirected. This preliminary notification eliminates the need for the router to learn through listening, completing the registration process immediately and avoiding delays while maintaining disaster recovery capability.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for migrating a service of a data center is disclosed. When an active data center is faulty, a tunnel processing device disables a locally-saved tunnel entry of a server in the active data center. After receiving a service access request packet from a customer edge router, the tunnel processing device acquires an IP address of a tunnel processing module deployed on a server in a standby data center according to an IP address of a destination virtual machine, encapsulates the service access request packet and routes the encapsulated packet to the tunnel processing module, so as to migrate a data center service from the active data center to the standby data center.