WO2018090795A1

WO2018090795A1 - Method and device for providing services

Info

Publication number: WO2018090795A1
Application number: PCT/CN2017/107500
Authority: WO
Inventors: Zujian ZHUANG; Jinfei Yu
Original assignee: Thomson Licensing SAS
Current assignee: Thomson Licensing SAS
Priority date: 2016-11-18
Filing date: 2017-10-24
Publication date: 2018-05-24
Anticipated expiration: 2019-05-18

Abstract

It is provided a method for providing services to a device, at an intermediate device to which the device is connected, comprising allocating communication addresses for servers that provide services, a communication address corresponds to a service; determining a request for a group of services including at least one service from the device; determining a routing table instance, which indicates a next hop, and a DNS proxy instance, which indicates a communication address by using which the gateway forwards a DNS query corresponding to the group of services, based on the group of services, wherein the routing table instance and DNS proxy instance are used for processing packets relating to the group of services from and to the device.

Description

METHOD AND DEVICE FOR PROVIDING SERVICES

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure relates to data process, and more particularly relates to a method and a device for providing services.

BACKGROUND

Nowadays most operators including telecom and cable multi-system operator (MSO) are offering multiple services, e.g. triple plays to residential customers/clients by a single access network in order to provide package of services to improve ARPU and attraction from customers.

Triple plays mostly stand for high speed Internet access, phone service e.g. in the form of Voice over IP (VoIP) , live TV and interactive TV service by IPTV. The access network varies from one operator to another, the dominant 3 types of access network mediums are xDSL over phone line, PON over fiber and Docsis over coaxial cable.

In order to segregate service domain boundary and meet security and QoS purpose, operators normally run and maintain separated networks for each kind of service. The Internet access service is considered to be public and world-wide available. It is network free for any types of communication with various protocols between hosts inside or outside the operator’s network, it is deemed to be less secure because of the openness, only best-effort is served without significant QoS guarantees except the committed access link data rate. On the opposite side, the VoIP and IPTV services are mainly walled garden offering provided only within operator’s private network. Herein, a walled garden refers to a restricted section of the Internet or network that users can access. For example, a service provider may create a walled garden that gives the user access to some content instead of all content or resource. And due to its specific service purpose, very few protocols and entities exist in such private network compared with Internet.

As explained above, there are multiple separated sub-networks within operator’s network to provide different service respectively. However only one access network medium reaches customer’s house or apartment, which means the multiple services are carried on a single medium towards customers’ house. At the residence end, the home gateway provided by operator terminates access network and delivers the triple play services to each home device. The home gateway normally has Ethernet LAN interface and 802.11 series interface to provide link connection in home network. Other home network link technology may also be used, such as PLC, MoCA, HPNA, they are all present with Ethernet like interface from perspective of IP communication.

As shown in the Fig. 1, the phone service is normally conducted by traditional telephone in the home, the connection between home gateway and telephone is twisted phone line carrying FXS/FSO signal and media, there’s no IP communication happened between them, the VoIP is actually performed inside the home gateway to translate between POTS and VoIP for signaling and voice streaming.

How to deliver triple play services to different home network devices boils down to how to deliver Internet access and IPTV services to home devices. Of course, there may be VoIP service delivered directly to the VoIP capable home device by IP connection. In that case, the VoIP service is similar to the IPTV service.

In xDSL and PON home gateway deployed by telecom operator, and in the cable home gateway from cable MSO, the current practices are similar, home gateway establishes multiple WAN interfaces with one or more access network, each WAN interface for one kind of service respectively. The WAN interface is then respectively bonded with a specific LAN interface of home gateway to serve for different services. For instance, the VoIP related WAN interface is provisioned with specific IP configuration and associated with internal VoIP application which in turn to serve for traditional telephones. The Internet service related WAN interface is provisioned with another specific IP configuration by PPPoE or DHCP methods, and then is associated with a LAN interface which has a private IP interface available to all PCs, smart phones and Pads. All those devices get the private IP addresses within same IP subnet from home gateway with home gateway as the next hop for all outgoing traffic towards Internet. The home gateway then performs the IP routing and necessary NAPT translation between public and private IP addresses. However for IPTV service, the specific LAN port of home gateway is designated to connect to IPTV end device such as IP STB, the IPTV related WAN interface is bridged inside home gateway with this dedicated LAN port, there’s no IP routing happened for this kind of service, the IPTV end device actually gets IP configuration from the server that resides in operator’s central office and communicates with IPTV platform servers directly, home gateway acts like a 2^nd layer switch for this service.

The current popular implementation of home gateway is actually hybrid mode, the Internet service is served by router mode but IPTV service is served by bridge mode. This mode has 2 significant drawbacks. First one is that the specific LAN port of home gateway must be designated for IPTV service, it requires logistics necessity to label correctly, and it may cause operational trouble when people mess the connection. Another drawback is due to the nature of hybrid mode, PCs or smart wireless handsets reside in different network from the IPTV end device, they are completely isolated which results in impossible to share media contents and to interact between those different devices even they are in the same home network.

SUMMARY

According to an aspect of the present disclosure, it is provided a method for providing services to a device, at an intermediate device to which the device is connected, comprising allocating communication addresses for servers that provide services, a communication address corresponds to a service； determining a request for a group of services including at least one service from the device； determining a routing table instance, which indicates a next hop, and a DNS proxy instance, which indicates a communication address by using which the gateway forwards a DNS query corresponding to the group of services, based on the group of services, wherein the routing table instance and DNS proxy instance are used for processing packets relating to the group of services from and to the device.

According to a variant, the request for the group of services is included in DHCP option 60.

According to another variant, the method further comprises storing correspondence relationship between the device, the routing table instance and the DNS proxy instance； receiving a DNS query from the device； determining the DNS proxy instance based on the correspondence relationship； and forwarding the DNS query through a communication address indicated by the DNS proxy instance.

According to another variant, the method further comprises receiving an IP packet from the device； determining the routing table instance based on the correspondence relationship； and forwarding the IP packet to a next hop based on the routing table instance.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, it is provided intermediate device for providing services to a device, comprising at least one server interface for communicating with servers that provides services； at least one device interface for communicating with devices that connect to the intermediate device； and at least one processor configured to allocate communication addresses for the servers, a communication address corresponds to a service； determine a request for a group of services including at least one service, which is received via the at least one device interface from the device； and determine a routing table instance, which indicates a next hop, and a DNS proxy instance, which indicates a communication address by using which on the at least on device interface the intermediate device forwards a DNS query corresponding to the group of services, based on the group of services, wherein the routing table instance and DNS proxy instance are used for processing packets relating to the group of services from and to the device.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, it is provided computer program comprising program code instructions executable by at least one for implementing above methods.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, it is provided a computer program product which is stored on a non-transitory computer readable medium and comprises program code instructions executable by at least one for implementing above methods.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, it is provided a computer readable storage medium having program code instructions executable by at least one processor for implementing above methods.

It is to be understood that more aspects and advantages of the invention will be found in the following detailed description of the present invention.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this application, will be used to illustrate an embodiment of the invention, as explained by the description. The invention is not limited to the embodiment.

In the drawings:

Fig. 1 is a system diagram according to prior art； and

Fig. 2 is a system diagram for providing services according to an embodiment of present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The embodiment of the present invention will now be described in detail in conjunction with the drawings. In the following description, some detailed descriptions of known functions and configurations may be omitted for clarity and conciseness.

In the present disclosure, we implement full router mode of home gateway for all kinds of services. This means all home devices including IPTV and VoIP end devices get IP addresses and related configurations in same IP subnet from home gateway, the home gateway establishes multiple WAN interfaces with one or more access networks, and each WAN interface corresponds to one service respectively. The home gateway is fully operational router for all services and is intelligent enough to distinguish different service demands from different home devices, and then performs IP routing and NAPT (network address port translation) functions between different home devices and corresponding WAN interfaces.

By full router mode of home gateway, an available or idle LAN port of home gateway is assigned for a real service or a real service consuming device automatically when the device is mounted to the network. There’s no need to designate a LAN port for service specific purpose in advance. Every LAN port can be automatically configured to serve a corresponding service according to what device is connected to the LAN port in real time.

A second advantage of full router mode of home gateway is that since all home devices no matter what service it requires get IP addresses and related configurations from one same IP subnet within the home network, the communication among home devices is no long isolated, they can communicate between each other, which makes the contents sharing and interaction within the home network no longer impossible. The possible applications for this advantage include sharing multimedia contents between the PC/smart phones and IP STB, so the media clips in PC or smart phones can be played on TV, and the smartphone can remotely control the IPTV playback.

By full router mode of home gateway, there’s no more bridged connection bonding between WAN interface and LAN interface within the home gateway. Home gateway performs routing and NAPT as well as some firewall operations between all WAN interfaces and all LAN interfaces in terms of customizable local policy.

Home gateway establishes multiple WAN interfaces with operator access network, for each WAN interface, home gateway acquires its IP address and related configurations such as default route and DNS servers by either PPPoE or DHCP methods. At LAN side, home gateway sets up a local DHCP server and DNS server, to assign IP addresses and related configurations to home devices and to serve for DNS queries initiated from home devices.

Each home device gets a different IP address, and the IP addresses allocated to all home devices belong to a same IP subnet. The IP communication between home devices and their corresponding service platforms is routed and NAPT inside home gateway to and from proper service specific network according to the service orientation of traffic.

Fig. 2 is a system diagram for providing services according to an embodiment of present disclosure. As shown in figure 2, basically the xDSL, PON (Passive Optical Network) , and cable home gateways can use the same architecture to implement full router mode. The detailed implementation is elaborated below with reference to PON ONU (Optical Network Unit) home gateway. It shall note that the principles described below apply to all other kinds of home gateways.

There are several services provided by operator, each has its own network and is completely logically isolated between each other in the operator’s network. Each service network has its own routing domain and DNS servers, as well as its associated servers for its own purpose.

There is only one access network at the side of residential customer, so the different service networks eventually merge at the home gateway. For each service, home gateway allocates one WAN interface for access network, and home gateway acts as IP host to get IP addresses and related configurations for the WAN interfaces one by one. Normally the IP configuration includes the IP address, default gateway and DNS servers, etc. and normally there are 2 DNS servers assigned to home gateway for each service related WAN interface. It shall note that one DNS server is also possible in some implementations. So the home gateway has the following configuration once all service related WAN interfaces are fully provisioned. By combination of the routing information (i.e. IP address, default gateway etc. ) and DNS servers for each service network, home gateway can provide multiple different routing table instances and DNS proxy instances in terms of services subscribed.

Table 1: Configuration table for WAN interfaces

Home gateway implements multiple routing table instances and DNS proxy instances according to services provisioning, each combination of one routing table instance and one DNS proxy instance serve for one service bundle associated with specific type of home devices. Here service bundle means one home device might be granted to access a group of services including one or more services at the same time instead of only one specific service. For instance, the IP STB may access the IPTV service provided in the walled garden internal network of service operator, and some OTT (over the top) contents from public Internet.

Each routing table instance is standalone and it is operational routing domain inside home gateway. So all routing table instances are isolated between each other. Home gateway implements multiple routing table instances like multiple VRF (virtual routing and forwarding) entities, which are used in policy-based routing implementation (Below is a brief for VRF, VRF is a technology that allows multiple instances of a routing table to co-exist within the same router at the same time. Because the routing instances are independent, the same or overlapping IP addresses can be used without conflicting with each other. Network functionality is improved because network paths can be segmented without requiring multiple routers. VRF may be implemented in a network device by distinct routing tables known as forwarding information bases (FIBs) , one per routing instance. Alternatively, a network device may have the ability to configure different virtual routers, where each one has its own FIB that is not accessible to any other virtual router instance on the same device) . Home gateway uses the policy-based routing, too. It chooses which routing table instance and DNS proxy instance to be used for each specific home device based on what kind of service bundle the device is granted to.

Each routing table instance is a routing table with each entry represents the next hop used to reach an IP subnet. When IP subnet overlap occurs, the longest IP subnet prefix matched take precedence to be used. The default route is indicated as 0.0.0.0/0 conventionally. In this example, there is no need to indicate WAN interface for forwarding the packets received from home devices because the gateway can decide the WAN interface based on the next hop. In a variant example, the routing table also indicates a WAN interface through which the packets shall be sent.

Destination IP	Destination netmask	Next hop
50.1.1.1	255.255.255.0	y. y. y. y
0.0.0.0	0.0.0.0	x. x. x. x

Table 2: an example of a routing table

Due to the fact that service bundle may be required for some home devices, home gateway needs to control the DNS server used to relay DNS query from each home device. Home gateway is provisioned to determine, for a home device that is granted for a service bundle, that the domain name in DNS query from home device is relayed to which DNS servers over which WAN interface. Home gateway achieves this by the DNS domain name pattern. As illustrated in the following table, for each DNS proxy instance, some DNS domain name patterns are defined to associate with WAN interface for the purpose of determining a WAN interface through which the DNS query shall be sent. The pattern uses the simple regular expression syntax, for instance, the pattern ‘*.iptvnet. com’ means any domain name under the zone ‘iptvnet. com’ . Pure ‘*’ pattern means to match any other DNS domain name.

DNS name pattern	Outgoing DNS servers
*. iptvnet. com	DNS servers from WAN interface 2
www. baidu. com	DNS servers from WAN interface 2
*	DNS servers from WAN interface 1

Table 3: a DNS instance

At the LAN side of home gateway, it establishes LAN interface with private IP address to serve for all wired or wireless home devices. Home gateway acts at LAN side as local DHCP server and DNS server. It assigns IP addresses to home devices in accordance with DHCP protocol from private IP address pool and designates itself as default gateway and DNS server for home devices along with the DHCP procedure.

During DHCP procedure, home devices sends requests for IP configuration to home gateway. Specifically, a home device sends a DHCP request having information indicating its device type to home gateway, and home gateway receives and determines the device type and then determines a service bundle (i.e. one or more services) that the device is allowed to access according to a stored correspondence relationship between service bundles and device types. In a variant of the embodiment, the information indicating or used for deciding the service bundle is carried in the DHCP request message. There are many ways to classify device type according to some properties of the device carried in DHCP request message, for example, the source MAC address or the OUI (organizationally unique identifier, which is a 24-bit number that uniquely identifies a vendor, manufacturer or other organization) can be used for determination, and normally the devices can identify their device class or device type by using DHCP option 60, option 77 or option 124. In below example, DHCP option 60 is used, but it shall note that any methods mentioned before can be used instead of DHCP option 60 to classify device type. As illustrated in the following table, DHCP option 60 is used to differentiate device types (i.e. which service bundle is granted) and the corresponding service bundle the device type is associated with. “*” means that there’s no DHCP option 60 existing for the home device or home gateway doesn’ t care what value it is.

Table 4: correspondence relationship between device types and service bundles

During DHCP procedure at LAN side, home gateway learns all information about each home device such as the IP address, its MAC address and DHCP option 60. In terms of the DHCP option 60 of home device, home gateway can determine proper routing table instance and DNS proxy instance for the device according to the table 4 and device type. As shown in table 5, home gateway records the correspondence relationship between them for later use, i.e. when home gateway receives packets from a home device, it can determine which routing table instance and DNS proxy instance will be used. Herein, the identification of home device can be realized by using IP address. By the combination of IP address and MAC address of home device, home gateway can prevent the IP spoofing from within the home network. It shall be noted that in some implementations the feature of prevention of IP spoofing is not implemented. In a variant implementation, home gateway stores the relationship between home device (e.g. through IP address) , the relevant routing table instance and the relevant DNS proxy instance in a single table for each home device. It may also store the MAC address. Herein, the difference between different implementations is just the number of tables to be used.

MAC address	IP address	DHCP Option 60
aa. aa. aa. aa. aa. aa	192.168.1.11	*
bb. bb. bb. bb. bb. bb	192.168.1.12	“IPTV”

cc. cc. cc. cc. cc. cc	192.168.1.13	“IPTV-E”

Table 5: stored MAC address and IP address for home devices

Home gateway determines IP address, configuration, routing table instance and DNS proxy instance for the home device. Specifically, the IP address and configuration are determined based on DHCP protocols. And the routing table instance and the DNS proxy instance are determined based on table 4 and device type. When home device tries to IP communicate with its service bundle related servers to obtain the service content, it initiates DNS query first for the target server domain name with home gateway as the DNS server. Home gateway receives the DNS query, and by acting as DNS proxy forwards to the proper WAN side DNS server for further DNS resolving according to the home device’s DNS proxy instance entries. Home gateway gets DNS response, i.e. resolved IP address of the service server, from DNS server at the WAN side and forwards the DNS answer to home device. Home devices starts the TCP or UDP communication with target server by resolved IP address as destination IP address, home device use home gateway as the next hop for any outgoing IP communication outside the home network, home gateway receives the IP packets and chooses the proper routing table instance to forward to proper WAN interface according to home device’s service bundle. Once the outgoing WAN interface is decided after routing process, the necessary NAPT translation may happen to perform source IP address change between home device’s private IP and WAN interface’s public IP. The response from WAN side will be forwarded to home device after proper inverse NAPT operation inside home gateway. In other words, for the packets destined for the service server, home gateway changes the source IP address from home device’s IP address to WAN interface’s IP address, and for the packets destined for home device, home gateway changes the source IP address from server’s IP address to LAN interface’s IP address.

Since all home devices get IP address from home gateway within one same private IP subnet, there’s no communication barrier between them, any kind of home device can communicate with the others no matter what device type or service bundle they are. So content sharing is easy with the use of DLNA technology or something like that. The audio/video/picture stored on PC or smart phones can be played by the IP STB directly, and the smart phone or tablet/pad can remotely control the playback on IP STB.

Above methods can be implemented in a gateway comprising one or more processors, one or more WAN hardware interfaces comprising optical interface, Ethernet interface, xDSL interface etc., one or more LAN hardware interfaces comprising WiFi interface in accordance with 802.11 protocols, Ethernet interface etc., one or more non-volatile storages and a volatile storage. The one or more processors are used for calculation and data processing. The one or more WAN hardware interfaces are used to communicate with service servers at WAN side. The one or more LAN hardware interfaces are used to communicate with connected home devices at LAN side. The one or more non-volatile storage medium are used to store and/or maintain stored data or stored information even if there is no power supply. The volatile storage medium is used to store data or information temporarily during data processing.

As will be appreciated by one skilled in the art, aspects of the present principles can be embodied as a system, method or computer readable medium. Accordingly, aspects of the present principles can take the form of an entirely hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment (including firmware, resident software, micro-code, and so forth) , or an embodiment combining software and hardware aspects that can all generally be referred to herein as a “circuit, ” “module” , or “system. ” Furthermore, aspects of the present principles can take the form of a computer readable storage medium. Any combination of one or more computer readable storage medium (s) may be utilized.

It shall be noted that the method may be implemented with program instructions stored in a computer readable storage medium. The computer readable storage medium can take the form of a computer readable program product embodied in one or more computer readable medium (s) and having computer readable program code embodied thereon that is executable by a computer. A computer readable storage medium as used herein is considered a non-transitory storage medium given the inherent capability to store the information therein as well as the inherent capability to provide retrieval of the information therefrom. A computer readable storage medium can be, for example, but is not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, or device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. It is to be appreciated that the following, while providing more specific examples of computer readable storage mediums to which the present principles can be applied, is merely an illustrative and not exhaustive listing as is readily appreciated by one of ordinary skill in the art: a portable computer diskette； a hard disk； a read-only memory (ROM) ； an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory) ； a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM) ； an optical storage device； a magnetic storage device； or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

Thus, for example, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that the block diagrams presented herein represent conceptual views of illustrative system components and/or circuitry embodying the principles of the invention. Similarly, it will be appreciated that any flow charts, flow diagrams, state transition diagrams, pseudo code, and the like represent various processes which may be substantially represented in computer readable storage media and so executed by a computer or processor, whether or not such computer or processor is explicitly shown.

A number of implementations have been described. Nevertheless, it will be understood that various modifications may be made. For example, elements of different implementations may be combined, supplemented, modified, or removed to produce other implementations. Additionally, one of ordinary skill will understand that other structures and processes may be substituted for those disclosed and the resulting implementations will perform at least substantially the same function (s) , in at least substantially the same way (s) , to achieve at least substantially the same result (s) as the implementations disclosed. Accordingly, these and other implementations are contemplated by this application and are within the scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.

Claims

A method for providing services to a device, at an intermediate device to which the device is connected, comprising

allocating communication addresses for servers that provide services, a communication address corresponds to a service；

determining a request for a group of services including at least one service from the device；

determining a routing table instance, which indicates a next hop, and a DNS proxy instance, which indicates a communication address by using which the gateway forwards a DNS query corresponding to the group of services, based on the group of services, wherein the routing table instance and DNS proxy instance are used for processing packets relating to the group of services from and to the device.
The method of claim 1, further comprising

allocating an IP address for the device in response to a DHCP request, wherein the request for the group of services is included in DHCP option 60.
The method of claim 1, further comprising

storing correspondence relationship between the device, the routing table instance and the DNS proxy instance；

receiving a DNS query from the device；

determining the DNS proxy instance based on the correspondence relationship； and

forwarding the DNS query through a communication address indicated by the DNS proxy instance.
The method of claim 3, further comprising

receiving an IP packet from the device；

determining the routing table instance based on the correspondence relationship； and

forwarding the IP packet to a next hop based on the routing table instance.
A intermediate device for providing services to a device, comprising

at least one server interface for communicating with servers that provides services；

at least one device interface for communicating with devices that connect to the intermediate device； and

at least one processor configured to allocate communication addresses for the servers, a communication address corresponds to a service； determine a request for a group of services including at least one service, which is received via the at least one device interface from the device； and determine a routing table instance, which indicates a next hop, and a DNS proxy instance, which indicates a communication address by using which on the at least on device interface the intermediate device forwards a DNS query corresponding to the group of services, based on the group of services, wherein the routing table instance and DNS proxy instance are used for processing packets relating to the group of services from and to the device.
The intermediate device of claim 5, wherein

the at least one processor is further configured to allocate an IP address for the device in response to a DHCP request received via the at least one LAN interface, wherein the request for the group of services is included in DHCP option 60.
The intermediate device of claim 5, further comprising

a storage configured to store correspondence relationship between the device, the routing table instance and the DNS proxy instance；

wherein the at least one processor is further configured to receive, via the at least one device interface, a DNS query from the device； determine the DNS proxy instance based on the correspondence relationship； and forward the DNS query through a communication address indicated by the DNS proxy instance.
The intermediate device of claim 7, wherein

the at least one processor is further configured to receive, via the at least one device interface, an IP packet from the device； determine the routing table instance based on the correspondence relationship； and forward, via the at least one communication interface, the IP packet to a next hop based on the routing table instance.
Computer program comprising program code instructions executable by at least one for implementing a method according to at least one of claims 1 to 4.
Computer program product which is stored on a non-transitory computer readable medium and comprises program code instructions executable by at least one for implementing a method according to at least one of claims 1 to 4.
A computer readable storage medium having program code instructions executable by at least one processor for implementing a method according to at least one of claims 1 to 4.