JP5700842B2 - Sleep control device, sleep control method, and program - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a technique for power saving of a communication network.

  The amount of power consumption of a communication network continues to increase in proportion to the increase in traffic. Due to the recent increase in environmental awareness, power saving of the entire network is required. As a technique for realizing power saving of a communication network, there is a communication apparatus sleep technique. The sleep technology is a technology that reduces the power consumption of the communication device itself by shifting the communication device to a sleep state (standby state or shutdown state).

  For example, when the traffic flow through the device is small, by transferring the traffic to some communication devices and devices, a communication device in which no traffic is flowing is created, and further this communication device is shifted to the sleep state, The power consumption of the entire communication network can be reduced.

  Since the current power consumption of the communication device hardly fluctuates depending on the load (traffic flow rate) of the communication device, it can be said that a state in which little traffic is flowing is a very inefficient power efficiency. Therefore, it is expected that the power efficiency of the entire network can be improved by performing sleep control flexibly according to the traffic fluctuation of the entire communication network by the sleep technology.

  In addition, according to Non-Patent Document 1, it can be seen that nationwide traffic fluctuates daily, with the early morning at the bottom and midnight at the peak. In other words, in a large-scale communication network, there is a lot of traffic during the day, so many communication devices can be operated, and conversely, some communication devices can be put to sleep in the midnight, thereby reducing the power consumption of the entire communication network. it is conceivable that.

  On the other hand, since frequent sleep control affects the failure rate, it is desirable to keep sleep control as few times as possible in a carrier grade device. However, if the number of times of switching is small, the power consumption cannot be flexibly changed with respect to traffic fluctuations, so that it is considered that the effect of power saving is reduced. Therefore, it is necessary to control to extend the sleep state time within a range that does not affect the quality of the communication network.

  In this specification, a state where a communication device such as a router is activated and performing communication processing is referred to as a “normal state”, and a state where the communication device is stopped and communication processing is not performed is referred to as a “sleep state”. .

"Aggregation and estimation of traffic on Japan's Internet," Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, Sept. 2011. "Proposal of distributed power-saving protocol to reduce network power consumption," 2009 UEC, B-7-105, p249, May 2009.

  In sleep control, the transition time between the normal state and the sleep state of the communication device occurs for a certain period of time, especially when traffic exceeding the link bandwidth occurs when shifting from the sleep state to the normal state. There is a possibility that packet loss, transfer delay, etc. occur. In order to avoid this, it is necessary to perform control in consideration of traffic fluctuations.

  To deal with this problem, Non-Patent Document 2 uses a method of periodically monitoring the usage rate of the router and estimating the increasing / decreasing trend of the usage rate from two moving averages with different periods. However, in this method, even when the traffic flow rate is a value that is significantly smaller than the link bandwidth, the transition control to the normal state is performed when it is determined that the traffic tends to increase. Thereby, since the period of a sleep state may become short, it is thought that the power reduction effect becomes low. Therefore, it is desirable to use a method that allows control to be applied at the time of traffic closer to the link bandwidth.

  Furthermore, in order to perform control with higher accuracy, it is desirable to be able to quickly detect sudden traffic fluctuations.

  For example, video services have a large transfer volume and are thought to be affected by sudden fluctuations, so sleep control can be performed not only from the total traffic volume but also from the traffic fluctuations for each service determined by a DPI (Deep Packet Inspection) device. If so, more accurate control can be expected. However, currently, a method for performing sleep control using flow information for each service has not been established.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and an object of the present invention is to provide a sleep control technique that has a higher power reduction effect than the prior art. It is another object of the present invention to provide a highly accurate sleep control technique that has a high power reduction effect and can quickly cope with sudden traffic fluctuations.

In order to solve the above problems, the present invention is a sleep control device that performs sleep control on a communication device in a network including a plurality of communication devices,
Storage means for holding preset threshold information;
Traffic information acquisition means for acquiring traffic information from each communication device in the network;
Control means for shifting a predetermined communication device from the normal state to the sleep state when the total traffic amount calculated from the traffic information is smaller than the traffic amount determined by the threshold information in the time period determined by the threshold information A sleep control device comprising :
The sleep control device further includes means for acquiring flow information about a predetermined detection target service from the network,
The control means does not shift the communication device in the normal state to the sleep state when the traffic state of the detection target service indicated in the flow information satisfies a predetermined condition. Configured as a device .

  The predetermined condition is, for example, that the transfer rate increase rate calculated from the flow information exceeds a threshold value determined by the threshold value information. The time zone is, for example, a time zone between a sleep time and a wake-up time included in the threshold information.

  Further, the traffic amount determined by the threshold information is, for example, a value obtained by multiplying the maximum bandwidth of the communication device having the maximum maximum bandwidth among the plurality of communication devices by the ratio defined in the threshold information. It is. Further, the predetermined communication device is, for example, a communication device other than the communication device having the maximum maximum bandwidth.

  The present invention can also be configured as a sleep control method executed by the sleep control device and a program for causing a computer to function as each unit in the sleep control device.

  According to an embodiment of the present invention, it is possible to provide a sleep control technique that has a higher power reduction effect than the conventional technique.

  In other words, by modeling the daily traffic fluctuation characteristics from past traffic fluctuations and adopting a method of setting a threshold in advance, the time zone is narrowed down to, for example, midnight when shifting to the sleep state or morning when shifting to the normal state In addition, in the early morning when the traffic flow is small, it is possible to realize control that keeps the sleep state longer in consideration of a small change in traffic that does not shift to the normal state.

  Also, according to an embodiment of the present invention, it is possible to provide a highly accurate sleep control technique that has a high power reduction effect and can quickly cope with sudden traffic fluctuations. In other words, more accurate control is possible by using threshold data of detection conditions set for each service.

1 is an overall configuration diagram of a system according to an embodiment of the present invention. 2 is a functional configuration diagram of a router 10. FIG. 2 is a functional configuration diagram of a DPI device 30. FIG. 3 is a functional configuration diagram of a management server 40. FIG. It is a figure which shows the example of the router information table stored in the router information holding | maintenance part 45. FIG. It is a figure which shows the example of the threshold value data stored in the threshold value information management part. It is a figure which shows the example of flow information. It is a figure which shows a control image. 6 is a flowchart illustrating sleep control processing example 1; It is a figure which shows the outline | summary of the sleep control by a traffic total amount threshold value. It is a flowchart which shows the sleep control processing example 2. It is a figure for demonstrating an effect.

  Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. The embodiment described below is only an example, and the embodiment to which the present invention is applied is not limited to the following embodiment.

(System configuration)
FIG. 1 shows an overall configuration diagram of a system according to an embodiment of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, the system according to the present embodiment includes a DPI device 30, a management server 40, and routers 10 and 20, and these are connected to each other through a network so that they can communicate with each other. The routers 10 and 20 are communication devices that perform packet transfer in the network 100 of the communication carrier. The network 100 of the communication carrier is connected to the Internet 104 and the user terminal 103 via gateway devices 101 and 102 arranged at the edge.

  The DPI device 30 is a device that receives information of a detection target service from the management server 40 and notifies the management server 40 of the flow information when the traffic of the detection target service is detected. The management server 40 is a device that performs sleep control for the router based on the status of each router to be managed and the flow information received from the DPI device 30.

  FIG. 2 shows a functional configuration diagram of the router 10. Since the router 20 has the same configuration, only the router 10 is shown in FIG.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the router 10 includes an interface A11, an interface B12, a packet processing unit 13, an interface C14, a router information management unit 15, and a power management unit 16.

  The interfaces A11 and B12 are interfaces that communicate with the network 100 side. The packet processing unit 13 performs processing for packet transmission / reception. The router information management unit 15 has a function of acquiring traffic information (such as MIB) from the packet processing unit 13 and holding it in storage means such as a memory. Traffic information is updated regularly. The power management unit 16 has a function of shifting the state of the router 101 in accordance with a control request related to sleep control from the management server 40 received from the interface C14.

  The interface C14 is an interface that communicates with the management server 40. When receiving a request for router information from the management server 40, the interface C14 receives MIB information from the router information management unit 15 and transmits it to the management server 201. A function of receiving a request for sleep control from the power management unit 16 and the like.

  Of the configuration of the router 101, the existing routers other than the interface C14 and the power management unit 16 are also provided. That is, a router according to this embodiment is obtained by adding the interface C14 and the power management unit 16 to an existing router.

  FIG. 3 shows a functional configuration diagram of the DPI device 30. As shown in FIG. 3, the DPI device 30 according to the present embodiment includes an interface A31, an interface B32, an interface C33, a packet processing unit 34, a packet comparison unit 35, and a flow information processing unit 36.

  The interface A31 and the interface B32 are interfaces connected to different routers, and the interface C33 is an interface for communicating with the management server 40. The packet processing unit 34 has processing for packet transmission / reception via the interfaces A31 and B32 and a function of mirroring packets flowing between the interface A31 and the interface B32.

  The packet comparison unit 35 holds information on the detection target service notified from the management server 40 and received from the flow information notification unit 36 in a storage unit such as a memory, and monitors and detects the packet mirrored by the packet processing unit 34. It has a function of determining whether there is a packet that matches the target service, and if there is, it notifies the flow information processing unit 36 of the flow information of the corresponding flow.

  The flow information processing unit 36 notifies the management server 40 of flow information related to the detection target service. When the flow information processing unit 36 receives information on a new detection target service from the management server 40, the flow information processing unit 36 notifies the packet comparison unit 35 of the information. It has a function.

FIG. 4 shows a functional configuration diagram of the management server 40. As shown in FIG. 4, the management server 40 according to the present embodiment includes an interface A41, an interface B42, a sleep control unit 43, a threshold information holding unit 44, and a router information holding unit 45.
The interface A41 is an interface that communicates with the router, and the interface B42 is an interface that communicates with the DPI device 30.

  The sleep control unit 43 confirms the state of each router for each managed router, stores the state of each router in the router information holding unit 45 as a router information table, and sends a threshold data detection target service to the DPI device 30. Based on the function, the function of acquiring the flow information for each detection target service from the DPI device 30, and the threshold data, the router information table, and the flow information for each service, the sleep control is performed for each router by the sleep control process. It has functions.

  The threshold information holding unit 44 stores preset threshold data. The router information holding unit 45 stores the router information table.

  FIG. 5 shows an example of the router information table stored in the router information holding unit 45. As shown in FIG. 5, the router information table includes device ID: ID for identifying the router, state: router state (0: sleep state, 1: normal state), maximum bandwidth: maximum bandwidth that the router can transfer [Mbps], Sleep processing time: Time required for transition from normal state to sleep state [sec], Wake-up processing time: Time required for transition from sleep state to normal state [sec], Traffic information log: Traffic information [ Mbps] is stored.

  Among the above information, “state” is information based on the current control content by the sleep control unit 43, and “traffic information log” is current traffic information collected from the router. Other than these, the information is stored in advance.

FIG. 6 shows an example of threshold data stored in the threshold information management unit 44. As shown in FIG. 5, the threshold data includes the traffic threshold ratio: the ratio to the maximum bandwidth during sleep, the sleep time: the time to shift to the sleep state (hhmm notation), and the wake-up time: the time to shift to the normal state (hhmm notation) ), Service to be detected: Discovery service (indicated by IP address as an example),
Detection conditions for detection target services: Including detection conditions (for example, the rate of increase in the transfer rate per second). The data related to the detection target service includes data for each detection target service.

  The traffic threshold ratio, sleep time, and wake-up time are determined by modeling the daily traffic fluctuation characteristics from the past traffic fluctuations. In this embodiment, “traffic threshold ratio” is used and a value obtained by multiplying the maximum bandwidth is used as a determination threshold. However, as threshold information, a traffic amount (transfer amount) serving as a determination threshold is set. Also good. The detection target service and its detection condition are determined based on the provision status and characteristics of each service.

  FIG. 7 shows an example of flow information acquired from the DPI device 30 for each service and used by the sleep control unit 43 to determine sleep control. As shown in FIG. 7, the flow information includes service name: service (for example, expressed by IP address), current transfer amount: current transfer amount [Mbps], transfer amount before t seconds: transfer amount before t seconds [ Mbps].

  The management server 40 can be realized by causing a computer having a communication interface and having a CPU, a memory, and the like to execute a program describing the processing contents described in the present embodiment. That is, the functions of the management server 40 (particularly the functions of the sleep control unit 43) are realized by executing a program using hardware resources such as a CPU and a memory built in the computer constituting the management server 40. Is possible. Further, the program can be recorded on a computer-readable recording medium (portable memory or the like), stored, or distributed. It is also possible to provide the program through a network such as the Internet or electronic mail.

(Sleep control overview)
Next, a control outline of how the sleep control in the present embodiment is performed will be described with reference to FIG. 8 as appropriate.

  When each router is in a normal state (example: area (1) in FIG. 8), the following control is performed.

  The management server 40 periodically acquires traffic information from each router, updates the router information table, and acquires flow information from the DPI device 30 based on the threshold data detection target service. Then, the management server 40 determines the state of the router from the router information table, the threshold data, and the flow information through sleep control processing (specific processing will be described later).

  If any router continues in the normal state, the process returns to the traffic information acquisition process. As a result of the determination, when any router shifts to the sleep state, the management server 40 requests the power management unit of the corresponding router to shift to the sleep state. As a result, the router requested to shift to the sleep state shifts to the sleep state, and power consumption is reduced.

  When one of the routers is in the sleep state (example: area (2) in FIG. 8), the following control is performed.

  The management server 40 periodically acquires traffic information from each router, updates the router information table, and acquires flow information from the DPI device 30 based on the threshold data detection target service. Then, the management server 40 determines the state of the router from the router information table, the threshold data, and the flow information through sleep control processing (specific processing will be described later).

  If any router continues in its current state, the process returns to the traffic information acquisition process. As a result of the determination, when any router shifts to the normal state, the management server 40 requests the power management unit of the corresponding router to shift to the normal state. As a result, the router requested to shift to the normal state shifts to the normal state and performs traffic processing.

(Sleep control processing example 1)
Next, sleep control processing example 1 executed by the sleep control unit 43 of the management server 40 will be described in detail with reference to the flowchart of FIG. This processing example 1 is an example in which flow information for each service is not used.

  Step 1) Traffic information indicating the transfer amount is acquired from all managed routers and stored in the router information holding unit 45 as a router information table.

  Step 2) The sum of the transfer amounts of all the routers (total traffic amount) is calculated, and it is determined whether or not the sum is smaller than the maximum bandwidth of the router having the largest maximum bandwidth × the traffic threshold. As a result of the determination, if Yes, the process proceeds to Step 3, and if No, the process proceeds to Step 5. Here, the sum of the transfer amounts of all routers is the sum of the transfer amounts of all routers in the normal state.

  Step 3) Obtain the current time, sleep time, and wake-up time, and determine whether sleep time <current time <wake-up time. If the result of determination is Yes, the process proceeds to step 4;

  Step 4) A router other than the router with the largest maximum bandwidth is changed to the sleep state, and the router information table is updated. If already in the sleep state, the sleep state is continued.

  Step 5) If No in Steps 2 and 3, all the routers in the sleep state are changed to the normal state. The router that was in the normal state continues the normal state as it is.

  The above processing is repeated, for example, at regular time intervals. In the above example, when the condition for changing to the sleep state is satisfied, the router that continues the normal state without entering the sleep state is the router with the largest maximum bandwidth, but the normal state is not entered without entering the sleep state. A plurality of routers to be continued may be determined (for example, a plurality of routers whose maximum bandwidth is a predetermined value or more). In this case, the determination in step 2 can be made by comparing, for example, “the sum of the maximum bandwidth of the router determined to continue the normal state × the predetermined threshold value” and the sum of the transfer amounts. These points are the same as in the case of Processing Example 2 described later.

  FIG. 10 is a diagram showing an outline of sleep control based on the traffic total amount threshold shown in the flowchart of FIG. As shown in FIG. 10, the control to the sleep state is not performed from the wake-up time until the sleep time, which is statistically known as high traffic, and falls below the threshold after the sleep time when the traffic decreases. Control to the sleep state is performed on the condition. After the sleep time, it becomes close to the wake-up time, and the control to the normal state is performed when the traffic exceeds the threshold value.

(Sleep control processing example 2)
Next, sleep control processing example 2 executed by the sleep control unit 43 of the management server 40 will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. In this processing example 2, in addition to the threshold control in the processing example 1, control using flow information for each service is performed. In order to obtain the power saving effect, it is not essential to perform control using flow information for each service. Even in only the threshold control of the total traffic amount as in the processing example 1, the effect of power saving can be obtained. According to the processing example 2, more accurate control can be performed.

  Step 11) Traffic information indicating the transfer amount is acquired from all managed routers, and is stored in the router information holding unit 45 as a router information table.

  Step 12) The sum of the transfer amounts of all the routers is calculated, and it is determined whether or not the sum is smaller than the maximum bandwidth of the router having the largest maximum bandwidth × the traffic threshold. As a result of the determination, if Yes, the process proceeds to Step 13, and if No, the process proceeds to Step 17. Here, the sum of the transfer amounts of all routers is the sum of the transfer amounts of all routers in the normal state.

  Step 13) Acquire the current time, sleep time, and wake-up time, and determine whether sleep time <current time <wake-up time. As a result of the determination, if Yes, the process proceeds to Step 14, and if No, the process proceeds to Step 17.

  Step 14) Send n pieces of detection target service information (n is an integer of 1 or more) to the DPI device 30 to obtain n pieces of flow information.

  Step 15) It is determined whether or not the increase rate calculated based on the detected flow information exceeds a threshold value (increase rate). More specifically, in this example, it is determined whether the gradient of the transfer amount in t seconds exceeds the threshold increase rate. That is, the increase rate of each detection target service is calculated by (current transfer amount−transfer amount before t seconds) ÷ t seconds, and at least one of the n pieces of flow information exceeds the threshold increase rate. In this case, the determination result in step 15 is Yes. If yes in step 15, go to step 17; if no, go to step 16.

  Step 16) A router other than the router with the largest maximum bandwidth is changed to the sleep state, and the router information table is updated. If already in the sleep state, the sleep state is continued.

  Step 17) If No in Steps 12 and 13 or Yes in Step 15, all routers in the sleep state are changed to the normal state. The router that was in the normal state continues the normal state as it is.

  In the above example, the transfer rate increase rate is used as the detection condition, but this is merely an example. As a detection condition, in addition to the traffic increase rate, a protocol type, a transfer amount, or the like may be used. That is, for example, in any of the detection target services, when a packet of a specific protocol type is detected, the control is performed to shift to the normal state (or the transition to the sleep state is not performed), or any of the detection target services When the transfer amount exceeds the threshold value, control for shifting to the normal state (or not shifting to the sleep state) may be performed. That is, the above control is performed when the traffic state of the detection target service indicated in the flow information acquired from the DPI device 30 satisfies a predetermined condition.

(Effects of the embodiment)
As described in the present embodiment, by using the threshold data of the band and time zone based on the past traffic fluctuation characteristics, it becomes possible to control according to the actual traffic fluctuation. In particular, in a time zone with little traffic, sleep control is not performed sensitively to small fluctuations in traffic, so that the sleep state of the router can be maintained and the power saving effect can be enhanced.

  Further, as described in the present embodiment, in addition to using bandwidth and time zone threshold data based on past traffic fluctuation characteristics, flow information for each service detected by the DPI device and individual information By using the threshold value data of the detection condition set for each service, it is possible to perform control with higher accuracy compared to control using fluctuation of the total traffic.

As an example, when the traffic increase / decrease rate is set as a threshold for each service as in this embodiment, it is possible to detect a situation where the traffic is increasing only for a certain service even if the total traffic is decreasing. For this reason, it is considered that the judgment when shifting from the normal state to the sleep state can be made appropriately.
This effect will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 12 shows a case where the traffic of service B increases and the total amount of traffic exceeds the threshold at about 8 minutes. In this situation, if sleep control is determined only by the total amount of traffic, it shifts to sleep, cannot cope with the increase in traffic of service B, and may cause link overflow. On the other hand, by determining the increase rate for each service, it can be determined that the transition to the sleep mode is not performed based on the increase rate of the service B, and therefore, an appropriate response can be made.

  The present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments, and various modifications and applications are possible within the scope of the claims.

100 Network 101, 102 Gateway device 103 User terminal 10, 20 Router 11 Interface A
12 Interface B
13 Packet processing unit 14 Interface C
15 Router information management unit 16 Power management unit 30 DPI device 31 Interface A
32 Interface B
33 Interface C
34 packet processing unit 35 packet comparison unit 36 flow information processing unit 40 management server 41 interface A
42 Interface B
43 Sleep Control Unit 44 Threshold Information Holding Unit 45 Router Information Holding Unit

Claims (7)

In a network composed of a plurality of communication devices, a sleep control device that performs sleep control for the communication device,
Storage means for holding preset threshold information;
Traffic information acquisition means for acquiring traffic information from each communication device in the network;
Control means for shifting a predetermined communication device from the normal state to the sleep state when the total traffic amount calculated from the traffic information is smaller than the traffic amount determined by the threshold information in the time period determined by the threshold information A sleep control device comprising :
The sleep control device further includes means for acquiring flow information about a predetermined detection target service from the network,
The control means does not shift the communication apparatus in the normal state to the sleep state when the traffic state of the detection target service indicated in the flow information satisfies a predetermined condition.
A sleep control device . The sleep control apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein the predetermined condition is that an increase rate of a transfer amount calculated from the flow information exceeds a threshold value determined by the threshold information. Wherein the time period, the sleep control device according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the time period between sleep time and wakeup time included in the threshold information. The traffic amount determined by the threshold information is a value obtained by multiplying the maximum bandwidth of the communication device having the maximum maximum bandwidth among the plurality of communication devices by the ratio defined in the threshold information. The sleep control device according to any one of claims 1 to 3 , wherein the sleep control device is characterized in that: The sleep control device according to claim 4 , wherein the predetermined communication device is a communication device other than the communication device having the maximum bandwidth. A sleep control method executed by a sleep control device that performs sleep control on a communication device in a network including a plurality of communication devices,
A traffic information acquisition step of acquiring traffic information from each communication device in the network;
When the total traffic amount calculated from the traffic information is smaller than the traffic amount determined by the threshold information during the time period determined by the threshold information held in the storage means, the predetermined communication device is put into sleep from the normal state. A sleep control method comprising: a control step for shifting to a state ;
The sleep control method further includes a step of acquiring flow information about a predetermined detection target service from the network,
In the control step, the sleep control device does not shift the communication device in the normal state to the sleep state when the traffic state of the detection target service indicated in the flow information satisfies a predetermined condition.
And a sleep control method . The program for functioning a computer as each means in the sleep control apparatus of any one of Claims 1 thru | or 5 .

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