CN108737274B

CN108737274B - Message forwarding method and device

Info

Publication number: CN108737274B
Application number: CN201810497551.1A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 王宁; 李大鲲
Original assignee: Hangzhou H3C Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Hangzhou H3C Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2018-05-22
Filing date: 2018-05-22
Publication date: 2021-02-26
Anticipated expiration: 2038-05-22
Also published as: CN108737274A

Abstract

The invention provides a message forwarding method and a device, wherein the method comprises the following steps: when the AC is the stacked main equipment and receives a first discovery request message of an Access Point (AP), generating a first filtering table item corresponding to the AP; and issuing the first filtering table entry to the switching equipment so that the switching equipment sends a first message matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through a first target port in the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry. The embodiment of the invention can reduce the message forwarding of the stacking link among the stacking member devices and improve the reliability of the stacking link.

Description

Message forwarding method and device

Technical Field

The present invention relates to the field of communications technologies, and in particular, to a method and an apparatus for forwarding a packet.

Background

In a large WLAN (Wireless Local Area Network), multiple ACs (Access controllers) are generally required to manage a large number of APs (Access points), each AC works independently and has a high management difficulty, and a failure of a single AC device causes a service interruption of a Wireless Network connected thereto.

In order to solve the above problem, multiple ACs may be stacked, such as an Intelligent Resilient Framework (IRF), which not only ensures uniform management and information backup of the APs, but also ensures that the APs are kept to be on-line and wireless services are not interrupted when an AC fails.

When the service physical links on the member devices in the stack are aggregated into one service logical link, load sharing is required among a plurality of service physical links, so that a situation that a message randomly selects a service physical port is brought.

In the centralized forwarding mode of the stack, the message forwarding is handled by a stacked Master device (Master), and due to inconsistent features of the message, when the switching device forwards the message to the AC side, a part of the message may be hashed to a stacked Slave device (Slave), and at this time, the Slave device needs to forward the message to the Master device through a stack link, thereby increasing the pressure of the stack link and reducing the reliability of the stack link.

Disclosure of Invention

The invention provides a message forwarding method and a message forwarding device, which are used for solving the problem that the reliability of a stacked link is reduced because a part of messages need to be forwarded through the stacked link in the existing stacked centralized forwarding mode.

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a packet forwarding method, applied to any AC in a stack formed by a plurality of ACs, where the stack is connected to a switching device through an aggregation link, the method including:

when the AC is the stacked master device and receives a first discovery request message of an AP, generating a first filtering table item corresponding to the AP; wherein the first filtering table entry includes a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching device;

sending the first filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a first message matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through a first target port in a port corresponding to the aggregated member port information included in the first filtering table entry; the first packet needs to be sent to an AC side, and both a source MAC address and a destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided a packet forwarding method applied to a switching device, where the switching device is connected to a stack including multiple ACs through an aggregated link, the method including:

receiving a first filtering table item sent by a stacking main device; wherein, the first filtering table entry includes a media access control MAC address of the stacking master device, a MAC address of an AP, and aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the stacking master device;

when a first message matched with the first filtering table item is received, the first message is sent to the stacking master device through a first target port in the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table item; the first packet needs to be sent to an AC side, and both a source MAC address and a destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a packet forwarding apparatus, applied to any AC in a stack formed by a plurality of ACs, where the stack is connected to a switching device through an aggregation link, the apparatus including:

a receiving unit, configured to receive a packet;

a generating unit, configured to generate a first filtering table entry corresponding to the AP when the AC is the stacked master device and the receiving unit receives a first discovery request packet of the AP; wherein the first filtering table entry includes a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching device;

a sending unit, configured to send the first filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a first packet matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through a first target port in ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry; the first packet needs to be sent to an AC side, and both a source MAC address and a destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a packet forwarding apparatus applied to a switching device, where the switching device is connected to a stack including a plurality of ACs through an aggregated link, the apparatus including:

the receiving unit is used for receiving a first filtering table item sent by the stacking main equipment; wherein, the first filtering table entry includes a media access control MAC address of the stacking master device, a MAC address of an AP, and aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the stacking master device;

the receiving unit is further configured to receive a message;

a sending unit, configured to send, when the receiving unit receives a first packet matching the first filtering table entry, the first packet to the stacking master device through a first target port in a port corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry; the first packet needs to be sent to an AC side, and both a source MAC address and a destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

By applying the technical scheme disclosed by the invention, when the AC is the stacked main equipment and receives the first discovery request message of the AP, the first filtering table item corresponding to the AP is generated and is issued to the switching equipment, so that the switching equipment sends the message matched with the first filtering table item to the AC through the target port in the port corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table item, the message forwarding of the stacking link between the stacking member equipment is reduced, and the reliability of the stacking link is improved.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic structural diagram of a message forwarding system according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 2 is a schematic flowchart of a message forwarding method according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 3 is a schematic flowchart of a message forwarding method according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 4 is a schematic structural diagram of a specific application scenario provided in the embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 5 is a schematic structural diagram of a message forwarding apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 6 is a schematic structural diagram of another packet forwarding apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 7 is a schematic structural diagram of a message forwarding apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Detailed Description

In order to make those skilled in the art better understand the technical solution in the embodiment of the present invention, a network architecture to which the embodiment of the present invention is applied will be briefly described below.

Referring to fig. 1, which is a schematic structural diagram of a message forwarding system according to an embodiment of the present invention, as shown in fig. 1, the message forwarding system includes a stack formed by a plurality of ACs and a switching device, where the stack and the switching device are connected by an aggregation link.

In the message forwarding system shown in fig. 1, the stacked master device may issue a filter table for indicating message forwarding to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a message, which is sent to the AC side and matches the filter table entry, through a port connected to the master device, thereby reducing message forwarding of the stacked link between the stacked member devices and improving reliability of the stacked link.

In order to make the aforementioned objects, features and advantages of the embodiments of the present invention more comprehensible, embodiments of the present invention are described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

Referring to fig. 2, a schematic flow chart of a message forwarding method according to an embodiment of the present invention is provided, where the message forwarding method may be applied to an AC, for example, any AC in the message forwarding system shown in fig. 1, and as shown in fig. 2, the message forwarding method may include the following steps:

step 201, when the AC is a stacked master device and receives a first discovery request message of an AP, generating a first filtering table entry corresponding to the AP; the first filtering table entry includes a MAC address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the AC.

For convenience of description, unless otherwise specified, hereinafter, all the ACs refer to the master device of the stack, MAC (Media Access Control) addresses of the ACs refer to bridge MAC addresses of the ACs, and aggregation member ports refer to aggregation member ports between the switching device and the ACs forming the stack, which will not be repeated in the following.

In addition, in the embodiments of the present invention, if not specifically described, the stacking operation is taken as an example in the centralized forwarding mode.

In this embodiment of the present invention, in order to reduce packet forwarding between stacking links between stacking member devices, for any AP, when an AC receives a first on-line control packet (i.e., a Discovery Request packet) of the AP, that is, when the AC receives the Discovery Request packet of the AP for the first time, the AC may generate a filter table entry (referred to as a first filter table entry herein) corresponding to the AP, where the first filter table entry is used to instruct an exchange device to forward a packet matching the first filter table entry to the AC through an aggregation member port (i.e., an aggregation member port connected to a main device on the exchange device) of the corresponding AC.

The first filtering table entry may include, but is not limited to, at least a MAC address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information of a corresponding AC on the switching device.

Step 202, sending the first filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends the first message matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through the first target port in the port corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry; the first packet needs to be sent to the AC side, and both the source MAC address and the destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

In the embodiment of the present invention, after the AC generates the first filtering table entry, the first filtering table entry may be issued to the switching device, and the switching device performs forwarding control on the packet sent to the AC side according to the first filtering table entry.

The specific implementation of the forwarding control performed by the switching device on the packet sent to the AC side according to the first filtering table entry may refer to the related description in the method flow shown in fig. 3, which is not described herein again in this embodiment of the present invention.

As can be seen, in the method flow shown in fig. 2, when detecting that the AP is online, the AC generates the first filter table entry corresponding to the AP, and sends the first filter table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device forwards the packet with the first filter table entry to the AC through the aggregation member port corresponding to the AC according to the first filter table entry, thereby avoiding forwarding the packet sent by the AP to the AC through the stacking link between the stacking member devices, reducing the pressure of the stacking link, and improving the reliability of the stacking link.

In addition, since the STA (Station) needs to associate the AP to go online, that is, messages sent by the STA to the AC side (e.g. messages sent by the STA to a PC (Personal Computer)) need to be forwarded through the AP, when the AP receives a message (wireless message) sent by the STA, a wired message package (source MAC address is the MAC address of the AP, and destination MAC address is the MAC address of the AC) is added to the outer layer of the message and sent to the switching device, so that, for the switching device, the characteristics of the messages sent by the STA and the messages sent by the AP are similar, and the switching device can control the messages sent by the STA to be directly sent to the AC through the aggregation member port according to the first filtering table entry, so that the messages sent by the STA to the AC side are prevented from being forwarded through the stacking links among the stacking member devices, the pressure of the stacking links is reduced, and the reliability of the stacking links is improved.

In one embodiment of the present invention, when the AC is a stacked master device and receives a first discovery request packet of the AP, the packet forwarding method may further include:

refusing to respond to the discovery request message;

and when the discovery request message of the AP is received again, responding to the discovery request message.

In this embodiment, considering that the first discovery request message of the AP received by the AC may be forwarded by other ACs (i.e., Slave devices (Slave)) in the stack through the stack link, if the AC directly responds to the discovery request message, the online port of the AP learned by the AC will become a stack port between the AC and the other AC, so that the message sent by the AC to the AP will be sent through the stack link, thereby increasing the pressure of the stack link and reducing the reliability of the stack link.

To avoid this, for any AP, when the AC receives the first discovery request packet of the AP, the AC may refuse to respond to the discovery request packet and wait for the AP to send the discovery request packet again.

And when the AC receives the discovery request message of the AP again, responding to the discovery request message.

The specific implementation of the AC responding to the AP discovery request message may refer to the related description in the existing related scheme, and the details of the embodiment of the present invention are not described herein.

Therefore, in this embodiment, the AP discovery request message responded by the AC is directly sent to the AC through the switching device, which avoids the forwarding of the message sent by the AC to the AP through the stacking link, further reduces the pressure of the stacking link, and improves the reliability of the stacking link.

It should be noted that, in the embodiment of the present invention, when the AC receives the first discovery request packet of the AP, it may also be determined whether the discovery request packet is received through the stack port, and if so, the processing is performed according to the manner described in the foregoing embodiment; otherwise, the AC may directly respond to the on-line processing packet, and the specific implementation thereof is not described herein.

In one embodiment of the present invention, the message forwarding method may further include:

when a first authentication message of the STA is received, generating a second filtering table item corresponding to the STA; the second filtering table entry comprises an MAC address of the STA and aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching equipment;

sending the second filtering table item to the switching equipment, so that the switching equipment sends a second message matched with the second filtering table item to the AC through a second target port in the port corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the second filtering table item; the second packet needs to be sent to the AC side, and the destination MAC address of the second packet is the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

In this embodiment, in order to avoid forwarding a message sent by the PC to the AC side (e.g., a message sent by the PC to the STA) through the stacked link, when the AC receives a first online control message (i.e., an Authentication message) of the STA, the AC may generate a filter table entry (referred to as a second filter table entry herein) corresponding to the STA, where the second filter table entry is used to instruct the switching device to send a message matching with the second filter table entry to the AC through an aggregation member port of the corresponding AC.

The second filter table entry may include, but is not limited to, at least a MAC address of the STA and aggregation member port information of a corresponding AC on the switching device.

In this embodiment, after the AC generates the second filtering table entry, the second filtering table entry may be issued to the switching device, and the switching device performs forwarding control on the packet sent to the AC side according to the second filtering table entry.

The specific implementation of the forwarding control performed by the switching device on the packet sent to the AC side according to the second filtering table entry may refer to the related description in the method flow shown in fig. 3, which is not described herein again in this embodiment of the present invention.

It should be noted that, in this embodiment, when the AC receives the first authentication packet of the STA, the AC may also respond to the authentication packet, and specific implementation thereof may refer to related descriptions in the existing related schemes, which is not described herein again in the embodiments of the present invention.

Referring to fig. 3, a schematic flow diagram of a message forwarding method according to an embodiment of the present invention is provided, where the message forwarding method may be applied to a switching device, such as the switching device in the message forwarding system shown in fig. 1, and as shown in fig. 3, the message forwarding method may include the following steps:

step 301, receiving a first filtering table item sent by a stacking master device; the first filtering table entry includes a MAC address of the stacking master device, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information corresponding to the stacking master device on the switching device.

In the embodiment of the present invention, specific implementation of the stacking master device generating the first filtering table entry and sending the first filtering table entry to the switching device may refer to related description in the method flow shown in fig. 2, and details of the embodiment of the present invention are not described herein again.

For convenience of description, the stacking master is taken as an example of the AC in the method flow shown in fig. 2, that is, if not specifically mentioned, the mentioned AC is the stacking master, and the following description of the embodiment of the present invention will not be repeated.

Step 302, when receiving a first message matched with a first filtering table item, sending the first message to a stacking master device through a first target port in a port corresponding to aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table item; the first packet needs to be sent to the AC side, and both the source MAC address and the destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

In the embodiment of the present invention, when the switching device receives a message that needs to be sent to the AC side, the first filtering table entry may be queried according to the message, so as to determine whether the message matches with the first filtering table entry.

When the switching device determines that the source MAC address and the destination MAC address of the packet are both included in the first filtering table entry, the switching device may determine that the packet (referred to herein as the first packet) matches the first filtering table entry.

It should be noted that, in the embodiment of the present invention, the first packet does not refer to a specific packet, but may refer to any packet that is received by the switching device and needs to be sent to the AC side, and the source MAC address and the destination MAC address are both included in the first filtering table entry.

In this embodiment of the present invention, when the switching device determines that the received first packet matches the first filtering table entry, the switching device may send the first packet to the AC through the first target port in the port corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry.

It should be noted that, when the number of the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filter table entry is one, the port is the first target port; when the number of the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filter entry is multiple, the first target port is any one of the multiple ports (the first target port may be selected from the multiple ports in a hash manner).

Because the first filtering table entry comprises the MAC address of the AP and the MAC address of the AC, messages sent by the AP to the AC and messages sent by the STA to the PC can be matched with the first filtering table entry, and when the switching equipment receives the messages, the messages can be forwarded to the AC through the aggregation member port corresponding to the AC, so that the messages are prevented from being forwarded through the stacking link, and the reliability of the stacking link is improved.

Further, in one embodiment of the present invention, the packet forwarding message may further include:

receiving a second filtering table item sent by the stacking main equipment; the second filtering table entry comprises an MAC address of the STA and aggregation member port information of the corresponding stacking main equipment on the exchange equipment;

when a second message matched with a second filtering table item is received, the second message is sent to the stacking master device through a second target port in the aggregation member port included in the second filtering table item; the second packet needs to be sent to the AC side, and the destination MAC address of the second packet is the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

In this embodiment, a specific implementation of generating, by the AC, the second filtering table entry and sending the second filtering table entry to the switching device may refer to related descriptions in the method flow shown in fig. 2, and details of the embodiment of the present invention are not described herein again.

In this embodiment, when the switching device receives the second filtering table entry sent by the AC, the switching device may perform forwarding control on the packet sent to the AC side according to the second filtering table entry.

Specifically, when the switching device receives a message that needs to be sent to the AC, the switching device may query the second filtering table entry according to the message to determine whether the message matches the second filtering table entry.

When the switching device determines that the destination MAC address of the packet is the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry, the switching device may determine that the packet (referred to as the second packet herein) matches the second filtering table entry.

It should be noted that, in the embodiment of the present invention, the second packet does not refer to a specific packet, but may refer to any packet that is received by the switching device and needs to be sent to the AC side, and the destination MAC address is a MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

In this embodiment, when the switching device determines that the received second packet matches the second filtering table entry, the switching device may send the second packet to the AC through a second target port in the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the second filtering table entry.

It should be noted that, when the number of the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the second filter table entry is one, the port is the second target port; when the number of the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the second filter entry is multiple, the second destination port is any one of the multiple ports (the second destination port may be selected from the multiple ports in a hash manner).

Because the second filtering table entry includes the MAC address of the STA, the packet sent by the PC to the STA may be matched with the second filtering table entry, and when receiving the packets, the switching device may forward the packet to the AC through the aggregation member port corresponding to the AC, thereby avoiding the packet from being forwarded through the stacking link and improving the reliability of the stacking link.

It should be noted that, in this embodiment, when the switching device receives a message that needs to be sent to the AC side, the switching device may first query the first filtering table entry according to the message, and further query the second filtering table entry according to the message when it is determined that the message is not matched with the first filtering table entry (for example, the source MAC address or/and the destination MAC address of the message are not included in the first filtering table entry); or, the switching device may first query the second filtering table entry according to the message, and further query the first filtering table entry according to the message when determining that the message is not matched with the second filtering table entry (e.g., the destination MAC address of the message is not the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry); or, the switching device may concurrently query the first filtering table entry and the second filtering table entry according to the message, and the specific implementation thereof is not described herein again.

Further, in one example, the second filter table entry may be generated by adding the MAC address of the STA to the corresponding first filter table entry.

Specifically, when the AC receives the first authentication packet of the STA, the AC may query the corresponding first filtering entry according to the MAC address of the AP carried in the packet, and add the MAC address of the STA to the queried first filtering entry to generate the second filtering entry.

In this example, after receiving a second filtering table entry sent by the AC, the switching device may replace a corresponding first filtering table entry (a first filtering table entry that is the same as the MAC address of the AP and the MAC address of the AC included in the second filtering table entry) stored locally with the second filtering table entry, and further, when the switching device receives a message that needs to be sent to the AC side, the switching device may query the second filtering table entry according to the message, and when the source MAC address and the destination MAC address of the message are both in the second filtering table entry, or when the destination MAC address of the message is the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry, determine that the message matches the second filtering table entry.

It should be noted that, in the embodiment of the present invention, considering that the stack formed by multiple ACs is not all operated in the centralized forwarding mode, for example, the stack formed by multiple ACs may also be operated in the load sharing mode, and in the load sharing mode, the above processing is not required, therefore, a switch for turning on or off the functions described in the above method embodiment may be set on the AC, and when the switch is in an on state, the AC may generate the filter table entry and issue the filter table entry to the switching device in the manner described in the above embodiment; when the switch is in the off state, the AC does not generate and issue the filtering table entry, so that the AC can adapt to different application scenarios, and the specific implementation thereof is not described herein.

In order to enable those skilled in the art to better understand the technical solution provided by the embodiment of the present invention, the technical solution provided by the embodiment of the present invention is described below with reference to a specific application scenario.

Referring to fig. 4, which is a schematic diagram of an architecture of a specific application scenario provided in the embodiment of the present invention, as shown in fig. 4, in the application scenario, an AC1 and an AC2 form an IRF, an AC1 is a master device, an AC2 is a slave device, and the IRF operates in a centralized forwarding mode; the IRF creates a service aggregation logic port BAGG1, which contains the following 4 member ports: GE1/0/1 and GE1/0/2(AC1 service port), GE2/0/1 and GE2/0/2(AC2 service port); the switch creates a service aggregation logic port BAGG2, which comprises the following 4 member ports: GE5/0/1 and GE5/0/2 (corresponding to AC1), GE5/0/3 and GE5/0/4 (corresponding to AC 2).

Based on the application scenario shown in fig. 4, the packet forwarding process provided in the embodiment of the present invention may be as follows:

the AC1 generates a table entry to be activated that records the following information: the bridge MAC (i.e., MAC address of AC1), AC peer switch physical interface and index of the IRF may be in the format shown in table 1:

TABLE 1

Switch side port	Switch side port index	Bridge MAC
			GE5/0/1	54	703d-1503-3d60
GE5/0/2	55	703d-1503-3d60

When the AP is online, the AP sends a first online control message, namely a Discovery Request message, when the switch receives the message, a port for forwarding the message can be determined according to a preset aggregation sharing algorithm, and if the determined port is GE1/0/1 or GE1/0/2, the message is directly sent to the AC 1; and if the determined port is GE2/0/1 or GE2/0/2, sending the message to the AC2, and forwarding the message to the AC1 through the stacking link by the AC 2.

When the AC1 receives the first Discovery Request of the AP, it acquires the MAC address of the AP, and adds it to the table entry shown in table 1, and generates a first filtering table entry, whose format may be shown in table 2:

TABLE 2

Switch side port	Switch side port index	Bridge MAC	AP MAC
				GE5/0/1	54	703d-1503-3d60	d461-fe59-4f00
GE5/0/2	55	703d-1503-3d60	d461-fe59-4f00

It should be noted that, in this embodiment, for each AP that goes online through the AC1, the AC1 may generate a first filter entry shown in table 2.

For convenience of description, hereinafter, unless otherwise specified, all the referred APs refer to the APs included in table 2.

In this embodiment, AC1 sends the first filtered entry shown in table 2 to the switch, refuses to respond to the first discovery request message sent by the AP, and continues to wait for the AP to resend the discovery request message.

The switch receives a first filtering table item sent by the AC1, and performs forwarding control on a received message that needs to be sent to the AC side according to the first filtering table item, where:

for the message sent by the AP, the source MAC address is the MAC address of the AP, and the destination MAC address is the MAC address of AC1, both of which are in the first filtering table entry, so that the switch shares the source MAC address with the MAC address of the AP and shares the source MAC address with the MAC address of the AC1 with the GE1/0/1 and the GE1/0/2 included in the first filtering table entry shown in table 2.

When a message sent by the STA passes through the AP, the AP can add wired encapsulation on the outer layer of the message, wherein the source MAC address of the outer layer is the MAC address of the AP, and the destination MAC address is the MAC address of the AC. When the switch receives the message sent by the STA, the message may also be matched with the first filtering table entry, so that the switch may also share the message with GE1/0/1 and GE1/0/2 included in the first filtering table entry shown in table 2.

It should be noted that, in this embodiment, when the switch learns the MAC address of the STA, the egress port of the generated MAC entry is the traffic aggregation logic port BAGG2 of the switch.

In this embodiment, when the AC1 receives the first online control packet, that is, the Authentication packet, of the STA, the MAC address of the STA may be obtained, and a second filter table entry corresponding to the STA may be generated, where the format of the second filter table entry may be as shown in table 3:

TABLE 3

Switch side port	Switch side port index	STA MAC
			GE5/0/1	54	c350-ed48-3eff
GE5/0/2	55	c350-ed48-3eff

AC1 may send the second filter table entry shown in table 3 to the switch.

For the message sent by the PC to the STA, the destination MAC address is the MAC address of the STA, the switch queries the MAC entry according to the destination MAC address of the message, determines that the egress port is the service aggregation logic port BAGG2, at this time, may continue to query the filtering entry, finds that the destination MAC address is the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering entry, at this time, the switch may share the destination MAC address with the GE1/0/1 and the GE1/0/2 included in the second filtering entry.

Therefore, in the embodiment, the switches of the messages sent to the ACs all directly send the messages to the AC1 through the aggregation member port corresponding to the AC1, so that the messages are prevented from being forwarded through the stacking link, and the reliability of the stacking link is improved.

It should be noted that, in this embodiment, the second filter table entry may be generated by directly adding the MAC address of the STA to the first filter table entry, and the format may be as shown in table 4:

TABLE 4

At this time, when the switch receives the message that needs to be sent to the AC side, the switch may directly query the second filtering table entry shown in table 4 according to the message, and if both the source MAC address and the destination MAC address of the message are included in the second filtering table entry (i.e., the message sent by the AP to the AC or the message sent by the STA to the AC or the PC), or the destination MAC address of the message is the MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry (i.e., the message sent by the PC to the STA), the switch may send the message to the AC1 through GE1/0/1 or GE 1/0/2.

It should be noted that, in the embodiment of the present invention, tables 1 to 4 may further include AC-side ports and indexes, that is, aggregated member port information (such as ports and indexes) on the AC as the stacked master device. Which in this embodiment is the AC1 physical interface and index.

As can be seen from the above description, in the technical solution provided in the embodiment of the present invention, when the AC is a stacked master device and receives a first discovery request message of an AP, a first filtering table entry corresponding to the AP is generated, and the first filtering table entry is issued to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a message matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through a target port in a port corresponding to aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry, thereby reducing message forwarding of a stacked link between stacked member devices and improving reliability of the stacked link.

Referring to fig. 5, a schematic structural diagram of a message forwarding apparatus is provided for an embodiment of the present invention, where the message forwarding apparatus may be applied to the AC in the foregoing method embodiment, and as shown in fig. 5, the message forwarding apparatus may include:

a receiving unit 510, configured to receive a message;

a generating unit 520, configured to generate a first filtering table entry corresponding to an access point AP when the AC is the stacked master device and the receiving unit 510 receives a first discovery request packet of the AP; wherein the first filtering table entry includes a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, aggregation member port information on the AC, and aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the AC;

a sending unit 530, configured to send the first filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a first packet matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through a first target port in ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry; the first packet needs to be sent to an AC side, and both a source MAC address and a destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

Referring to fig. 6 together, which is a schematic structural diagram of another message forwarding apparatus provided in the embodiment of the present invention, as shown in fig. 6, on the basis of the message forwarding apparatus shown in fig. 5, the message forwarding apparatus shown in fig. 6 may further include:

a responding unit 540, configured to, when the AC is the stacked master device and the receiving unit 510 receives the first discovery request packet of the AP, refuse to respond to the discovery request packet;

the responding unit 540 is further configured to respond to the discovery request packet when the receiving unit 510 receives the discovery request packet of the AP again.

In an optional embodiment, the generating unit 520 is further configured to generate a second filtering table entry corresponding to the STA when the receiving unit receives a first authentication packet of the STA; wherein the second filtering table entry includes a MAC address of the STA, aggregation member port information on the AC, and aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the AC;

the sending unit 530 is further configured to send the second filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a second packet matched with the second filtering table entry to the AC through a second target port in the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the second filtering table entry; and sending the second message to an AC side, wherein a destination MAC address of the second message is an MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

Referring to fig. 7, a schematic structural diagram of a message forwarding apparatus is provided for an embodiment of the present invention, where the message forwarding apparatus may be applied to a switching device in the foregoing method embodiment, and as shown in fig. 7, the message forwarding apparatus may include:

a receiving unit 710, configured to receive a first filter table entry sent by a stacking master device; wherein, the first filtering table entry includes a media access control MAC address of the stacking master device, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the stacking master device;

the receiving unit 710 is further configured to receive a message;

a sending unit 720, configured to send, when the receiving unit 710 receives a first packet matching the first filtering table entry, the first packet to the stacking master device through a first target port in a port corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry; the first packet needs to be sent to an AC side, and both a source MAC address and a destination MAC address of the first packet are included in the first filtering table entry.

In an optional embodiment, the receiving unit 710 is further configured to receive a second filter table entry sent by the stacking master device; wherein, the second filtering table entry includes the MAC address of the STA and the aggregation member port information on the switching device corresponding to the stacking master device;

the sending unit 720 is further configured to send, when the receiving unit 710 receives a second packet matching the second filtering table entry, the second packet to the stacking master device through a second target port in the aggregation member ports included in the second filtering table entry; and sending the second message to an AC side, wherein a destination MAC address of the second message is an MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

The implementation process of the functions and actions of each unit in the above device is specifically described in the implementation process of the corresponding step in the above method, and is not described herein again.

For the device embodiments, since they substantially correspond to the method embodiments, reference may be made to the partial description of the method embodiments for relevant points. The above-described embodiments of the apparatus are merely illustrative, and the units described as separate parts may or may not be physically separate, and parts displayed as units may or may not be physical units, may be located in one place, or may be distributed on a plurality of network units. Some or all of the modules can be selected according to actual needs to achieve the purpose of the scheme of the invention. One of ordinary skill in the art can understand and implement it without inventive effort.

As can be seen from the above embodiments, when the AC is a stacked master device and receives a first discovery request message of an AP, a first filtering table entry corresponding to the AP is generated, and the first filtering table entry is issued to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a message matched with the first filtering table entry to the AC through a port corresponding to aggregation member port information included in the first filtering table entry, thereby reducing message forwarding of a stacking link between stacking member devices and improving reliability of the stacking link.

Other embodiments of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention disclosed herein. This application is intended to cover any variations, uses, or adaptations of the invention following, in general, the principles of the invention and including such departures from the present disclosure as come within known or customary practice within the art to which the invention pertains. It is intended that the specification and examples be considered as exemplary only, with a true scope and spirit of the invention being indicated by the following claims.

It will be understood that the invention is not limited to the precise arrangements described above and shown in the drawings and that various modifications and changes may be made without departing from the scope thereof. The scope of the invention is limited only by the appended claims.

Claims

1. A message forwarding method is applied to any AC in a stack formed by a plurality of Access Controllers (ACs), and the stack is connected with a switching device through an aggregation link, and is characterized by comprising the following steps:

when the AC is the stacked main equipment and receives a first discovery request message of an Access Point (AP), generating a first filtering table item corresponding to the AP; wherein the first filtering table entry includes a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching device;

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein when the AC is the primary device of the stack and receives a first discovery request message of an AP, the method further comprises:

refusing to respond to the discovery request message;

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

generating a second filtering table item corresponding to the STA when a first authentication message of the STA of a station is received; wherein, the second filtering table entry includes the MAC address of the STA and the aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching device;

sending the second filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a second message matched with the second filtering table entry to the AC through a second target port in the ports corresponding to the aggregated member port information included in the second filtering table entry; and sending the second message to an AC side, wherein a destination MAC address of the second message is an MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

4. A message forwarding method is applied to a switching device, the switching device is connected with a stack comprising a plurality of Access Controllers (ACs) through an aggregation link, and the method comprises the following steps:

receiving a first filtering table item sent by a stacking main device; the first filtering table entry is generated by a stacked master device when receiving a first discovery request message of an Access Point (AP), and comprises a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the stacked master device, an MAC address of the AP and aggregation member port information corresponding to the stacked master device on the switching device;

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

receiving a second filtering table item sent by the stacking master device; the second filtering table entry comprises an MAC address of an STA and aggregation member port information corresponding to the stacking master device on the switching device;

when a second message matched with the second filtering table item is received, sending the second message to the stacking master device through a second target port in the aggregation member port included in the second filtering table item; and sending the second message to an AC side, wherein a destination MAC address of the second message is an MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

6. A message forwarding apparatus applied to any AC in a stack formed by a plurality of Access Controllers (ACs), the stack being connected to a switching device through an aggregation link, the apparatus comprising:

a receiving unit, configured to receive a packet;

a generating unit, configured to generate a first filtering table entry corresponding to an access point AP when the AC is the stacked master device and the receiving unit receives a first discovery request packet of the AP; wherein the first filtering table entry includes a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the AC, a MAC address of the AP, and aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching device;

7. The apparatus of claim 6, further comprising:

a response unit, configured to, when the AC is the stacked master device and the receiving unit receives the first discovery request packet of the AP, refuse to respond to the discovery request packet;

the response unit is further configured to respond to the discovery request packet when the receiving unit receives the discovery request packet of the AP again.

8. The apparatus of claim 6,

the generating unit is further configured to generate a second filtering table entry corresponding to the STA when the receiving unit receives the first authentication packet of the STA; wherein, the second filtering table entry includes the MAC address of the STA and the aggregation member port information corresponding to the AC on the switching device;

the sending unit is further configured to send the second filtering table entry to the switching device, so that the switching device sends a second packet matched with the second filtering table entry to the AC through a second target port in the ports corresponding to the aggregation member port information included in the second filtering table entry; and sending the second message to an AC side, wherein a destination MAC address of the second message is an MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.

9. A message forwarding apparatus applied to a switching device, the switching device being connected to a stack including a plurality of access controllers AC via an aggregation link, the apparatus comprising:

the receiving unit is used for receiving a first filtering table item sent by the stacking main equipment; the first filtering table entry is generated by a stacked master device when receiving a first discovery request message of an Access Point (AP), and comprises a Media Access Control (MAC) address of the stacked master device, an MAC address of the AP and aggregation member port information corresponding to the stacked master device on the switching device;

the receiving unit is further configured to receive a message;

10. The apparatus of claim 9,

the receiving unit is further configured to receive a second filtering table entry sent by the stacking master device; the second filtering table entry comprises an MAC address of an STA and aggregation member port information corresponding to the stacking master device on the switching device;

the sending unit is further configured to send, when the receiving unit receives a second packet matching the second filtering table entry, the second packet to the stacking master device through a second target port in the aggregation member port included in the second filtering table entry; and sending the second message to an AC side, wherein a destination MAC address of the second message is an MAC address of the STA included in the second filtering table entry.