| US 7,376,743 B1 | ||
| Method and apparatus for load balancing in a virtual private network | ||
| John Bazzinotti, Norwood, Mass. (US); Peter Scott Davis, Wakefield, Mass. (US); Kenneth John Wante, Bellingham, Mass. (US); Timothy Steven Champagne, South Attleborough, Mass. (US); and Dany J. Rochefort, Norfolk, Mass. (US) | ||
| Assigned to Cisco Technology, Inc., San Jose, Calif. (US) | ||
| Filed on Oct. 29, 2002, as Appl. No. 10/282,816. | ||
| Claims priority of provisional application 60/369280, filed on Apr. 02, 2002. | ||
| Int. Cl. G06F 15/16 (2006.01); G06F 15/177 (2006.01); G06F 15/173 (2006.01); G06F 3/00 (2006.01); G06F 5/00 (2006.01); G06F 11/00 (2006.01); G01R 31/08 (2006.01); G08C 15/00 (2006.01); H04J 1/16 (2006.01); H04J 3/14 (2006.01); H04L 1/00 (2006.01); H04L 12/26 (2006.01) | ||
| U.S. Cl. 709—229 [709/220; 709/226; 710/38; 370/236; 370/237] | 13 Claims |
| 1. In a master concentrator device, a method for balancing incoming client connection requests among a plurality of concentrator
devices configured in a cluster arrangement, including the master concentrator device, the plurality of concentrator devices
providing access to a virtual private network, the method comprising the steps of:
receiving load data describing current load conditions of the concentrator devices wherein the load is a ratio of a current
number of connections in a particular concentrator to a configured value of maximum allowed connections for the particular
concentrator, wherein said value of maximum allowed connections is different than a maximum number of connections the particular
concentrator can handle in order to limit load on said particular concentrator, which includes:
receiving a KEEPALIVE message transmitted by each concentrator device on a reoccurring basis, said KEEPALIVE message containing
the load of a transmitting concentrator device and indicating that the transmitting concentrator device is operative and immediately
sending a response to the transmitting concentrator device for each received KEEPALIVE message, said response including least
loaded concentrator device data;
providing a virtual cluster address in order to receive client virtual private network connection requests for access to the
virtual private network, said virtual cluster address providing a public interface for a virtual private network client to
access the virtual private network;
receiving from the virtual private network client an initial client connection request for a virtual private network connection,
said initial client connection directed to the virtual cluster address;
selecting one of the plurality of concentrator devices based upon the load data describing current load conditions of the
concentrator devices, said selected device to handle said virtual private network connection; and
transmitting, to the virtual private network client, an address of the selected concentrator device.
|