White Paper: Self-Learning IP

Authors: Jim Ervin & Rana Dayal Authors

Multiprotocol Switching Development Networking Division International Business Machines Corporation Research Triangle Park, N.C.

February 12, 1998May 18, 1999 Document Status: Version 1.0

IBM Non-Confidential Non-Confidential

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Self-Learning IP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Functionality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Benefits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Self-Learning IP
In the market today there is a new breed of products called Router Accelerators. These are network devices that when placed between a router and its associated LAN interfaces, will learn Layer 3 information and forward traffic at wire speeds based on IP addresses and their associated switch ports. The Self Learning IP feature provides this service. Self-Learning IP requires no configuration for most networks. It will enable a LAN Switch that is inserted between a software-based Router and associated LAN interfaces, to snoop out the proper IP routing information and mimic the operation of the existing Router. Once the routing information is learned, the LAN Switch will take over the routing of all local IP data, and transparently pass the data that it cannot route to the Router. No manual configuration or intervention is required for either the LAN Switch or for the existing Router. Self-Learning IP does not rely on a routing protocol. It works seamlessly in networks that may use either RIP, OSPF, IGRP, EIGRP etc. Please note that even though Self-Learning IP is not really switch-specific, in this paper we will assume the switch to be one similar to the IBM 8371 switch. The 8371 Switch is a multi port 10/100Mbps Ethernet Switch with specialized ASICs for routing/switching.

Functionality
In its simplest form of deployment at least two Switch ports are required for every Router port that is to be accelerated. These pairs of ports are connected as illustrated in the diagram below. The Router port that was initially connected to a LAN segment is now connected to a Switch port. Another port on the Switch is now connected to the LAN segment that the Router port was initially connected to. So with a simple wiring change for Router ports, and with no reconfiguration to the Router, the Switch can start offloading the IP forwarding from the Router. In this particular example, routing of all the IP traffic between the Server Farms, Engineering and Marketing is handled by the Switch. All traffic to the Internet (Wan) is still handled by the Router. Also note that in the illustration below, not only have the IP forwarding duties been offloaded to the Switch, but uplinks from the LAN segments to the Router have also been upgraded to 100Mbps without having to incur an expensive router upgrade. So this is yet another way that Self-Learning IP can be used to improve network performance.

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In this manner the Switch with the Self-Learning IP feature can be inserted between the backbone Router and its LAN segments.
When the switch with Self-Learning IP is "inserted" in front of a loaded legacy Router, it takes over all the IP "routing" on the local LAN. All data that it cannot "route" (eg.traffic to the Wan) will be passed through unmodified to the Router, which is now free to handle such traffic.

WAN

Legacy Router

Subnet 1 10 Mbps

Subnet 2 10Mbps

Subnet 3 10 Mbps

Switch with Self-Learning IP

Subnet 1 100 Mbps

Subnet 2 10 or 100 Mbps

Subnet 3 100 Mbps

Engineering

Marketing

Server Farm

Figure 1 Example: Self-Learning IP

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Features
Some of the main features of Self-Learning IP are listed below: Auto Configuration - Self-Learning IP snoops IP address information from traffic passing through the switch. No device configuration is required. Also, for most deployments, no reconfiguration of existing network equipment is required. Routing Protocol Independence - Self-Learning IP does not use routing protocols to improve network performance. It can be deployed in any routed network. Router Mimicking - Self-Learning IP will mimic the Router that it is accelerating. This means that a packets routed by the Switch will be indistinguishable from packets routed by the Router. The Switch will modify both destination and source MAC addresses, decrement the IP header TTL, recalculate the checksum. etc, Performance - The routing performed by Self-Learning IP is hardware based. Layer-3 traffic can be forwarded at wire speed over Fast Ethernet LANs. Speed Matching - The Ethernet ports are 10/100 Mbps auto-sensing. This means that intersubnet links can be upgraded to 100 Mbps while the routers connections can remain at 10Mbps, thus avoiding expensive router upgrades to Fast Ethernet. Cost - A switch with Self-Learning IP will be much less expensive than traditional routers on a per-port basis. Port Fanout - Self Learning is independent of wiring constraints. It is NOT necessary to wire the switch to the router in a specific way (like most of the Router Accelerators today). So one could fanout a single router port to multiple LAN segments.

Benefits
The Self-Learning IP capability in a switch allows network administrators to have a simple incremental migration path from traditional routers to the next-generation multilayer switching. Self-Learning IP can play an important role in this migration path by producing immediate benefits by handling a congested backbone routers inter-LAN traffic and letting the router handle the backbone WAN traffic. So initially the LAN Switch can be immediately deployed into existing networks without any disruption and then gradually the routing protocols (like RIP, OSPF etc.) can be enabled in the multilayer Switch and the Router in the backbone can be removed. If so desired the network manager can also keep the Router around for a while, functioning as a peer router to the multilayer LAN Switch. This multistage deployment is illustrated in the diagram below. As we can see fork-lift upgrades are not necessary. 5/18/99 Router Accelerator: Self-Learning IP 5

White Paper: Self-Learning IP

To backbone Router To backbone Router To backbone Router To switched backbone Switch

Switch To LAN segments

Switch To LAN segments

To LAN segments

To LAN segments

Stage 1: Classic Backbone A legacy Router is used to route traffic not only between local segments but also traffic between the local segments and the backbone.Typically such a Router is heavily loaded as it has to serve both the local LAN and the backbone traffic

Stage 2: Accelerated Router Switch with Self-Learning IP is "inserted" in front of the Router. The Switch now takes over the local routing between LAN segments and offloads the Router to concentrate on routing the backbone traffic. No configuration is required.

Stage 3: Peer Router Routing function is now turned on in the Switch. which can now finction as a full-blown router. The old Router can now act as a peer router to support old WAN links. The interfaces on the old Router may be collapsed so it can function as a 'one armed'. router.

Stage 4: L-3/L-4 Switching The Multilayer switch can now replace the legacy Router completely if a move is made to a switched backbone.

Figure 2 Example: Migration to a switched L-3/L-4 Network To summarize, the Self-learning IP feature in the LAN Switch makes it an immediate plug-and-play accelerator for the backbone Router, which can now concentrate on the backbone WAN traffic instead of the local inter-LAN traffic, which is now handled by the Switch.

Limitations
The Self-Learning IP function has certain limitations that one should be aware of: 5/18/99 It does not run routing protocols like RIP, OSPF etc. and hence does not replace a traditional router, but rather assists it. For it to off load a Routers interfaces, the interfaces that are connected to the switch must respond to ICMP frames, or have routing protocols enabled on them. Self-Learning IP currently will not learn hosts that reside behind routers. Self-Learning IP does not work across ATM links. Router Accelerator: Self-Learning IP 6

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Performance
Performance gains achieved by using Self-Learning IP are very dramatic. For example if a fully-loaded 10 Mbps full duplex router were to be front-ended be a switch, the CPU utilization of the router would go down and the overall routing performance would increase tenfold even if only two 100Mbps end stations are used. The graph below illustrates the increase in routing performance achieved by using Self-Learning IP in a network with a 10Mbps backbone.
250 200 Data Rate Mbps 150 100 50 0 Routing Performance

Router Router Front Ended by Switch

The graph below illustrates the decrease in CPU utilization of the router when a switch with Self-Learning IP is used to front-end it.
100 90 80 CPU Utilization % 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 CPU Utilization Router Router Front Ended by Switch

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Deployment
The following diagrams illustrates some other scenarios that a switch with Self-Learning IP can be deployed to assist in off loading the backbone router:

Before
Backbone Router (Loaded)
10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps

After
Backbone Router (Offloaded)
10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps

Switch with SelfLearningIP

100Mbps 100Mbps 100Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps

To LAN Subnets

To LAN Subnets

Figure 3 Deployment: Simple Connection This is the most common scenario for inserting a switch with Self-Learning IP into a network. One port of the switch is connected up to the router, while another port is connected to the LAN segment. The other ports on the switch can be used for L-2 bridging. Note that the network was initially only limited to 10Mbps. After deployment of the switch the part to whole of the network can be upgraded to 100Mbps with no reconfiguration. For eg. In the figure above three subnets have been upgraded to 100 Mbps while two are still at 10Mbps, and the router interfaces are still 10Mbps.

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Before
Backbone Router (Loaded)

After
Backbone Router (Offloaded)

Switch with SelfLearningIP

Hub

Hub

Hub

Hub

To LAN Subnets (Additional Fanout)

To LAN Subnets

Figure 4 Deployment: 1 to N Fanout

This scenario is the same as the previous, with the exception that for every port on the switch that is connected to the router, one or more ports can be connected to LAN segments. In fact now even more subnets can be added in the network, without having to take into account the traffic handling capabilities of the router.

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White Paper: Self-Learning IP

Before
Backbone Router (Loaded)

After
Backbone Router (Collapsed & Offloaded)

Switch with SelfLearningIP

To LAN Subnets

To LAN Subnets

Figure 5 Deployment: Collapsed Router In this scenario a network administrator can free up arms of the backbone router and connect all the subnets onto one arm. The switch will route traffic between ports to the router interface will be relatively load free. This scenario requires reconfiguration of the router.

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Before
Backbone Router1 (Loaded) Backbone Router2 (Loaded)

After
Backbone Router1 (OffLoaded) Backbone Router2 (OffLoaded)

Shared Switch with SelfLearningIP

To LAN#1 Subnets

To LAN#2 Subnets

To LAN#1 Subnets

To LAN#2 Subnets

Figure 6 Deployment: Shared Switch In this scenario a single switch with Self Learning IP can be shared among more than one router. Note that the reverse is currently not possible, that is, multiple switches cannot be used by a single router.

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Before

After

Server & Router

Server & Router

Switch with SelfLearningIP

Hub Hub Hub Hub

To LAN Subnets

To LAN Subnets

Figure 7 Deployment: Small Office

In many small offices today, the server, whether it be Netware, Unix, Linux, OS/2 or NT, has dual personalities. It acts both as a server and a router. The machine cycles that are required for the router function degrade the overall performance of the server. Inserting a switch with Self-Learning IP will increase the routing performance of the system and reduce the unnecessary load on the server. Overall network performance is increased.

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Before

After

WAN Router

WAN Router

Server & Router

Server

Switch with SelfLearningIP

Hub

Hub

Hub

Hub

To LAN Subnet1

To LAN Subnet2

To LAN Subnet1

To LAN Subnet2

Figure 8 Deployment: Small Office with WAN connection As before, the server is doing both routing and server functions. In addition a low performance router is installed for a WAN connection. Now the routing function can be turned off in the server, and the WAN router configured with all the subnets. Normally, such a router would be much too slow to do the routing function. However, with the Self-Learning IP switch assisting it, routing can be done at wire-speed.

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Before
Nways 2210 Backbone Router (Loaded)
10Mbps 10Mbps 10Mbps

After
Nways 2210 Backbone Router (Offloaded)
10Mbps

8242 Hub

8242 Hub

8371 Switch with SelfLearningIP

To 10Mb LAN Subnets 2210 - Nways Multiprotocol Router 8242 - 16 Port Ethernet Hub 8371 - 32 Port Multilayer Ethernet Switch

To 10Mb or 100Mb LAN Subnets

Figure 9 Deployment: Increased Routing Throughput.

In the above scenario the total IP routing capacity of the system is limited by the routing capacity of the 2210. For example, an Nways 2210 Model 24E can route 64 byte packets ethernet-to-ethernet at 15,000 PPS while using 95% of the CPU. If the 8242 hubs are now replaced by the 8371 switch, and the LAN subnets remain at full-duplex 10Mbps the IP routing capacity suddenly becomes almost 450,000 PPS for 64 byte packets, and the CPU utilization on the 2210 goes down to 5%. This 30-fold increase is achievable with no reconfiguration at all. But if the LAN subnets are upgraded to 100Mbps full-duplex, the total routing capacity becomes 3 million PPS for 64 byte frames, and the CPU utilization on the 2210 still remains at a paltry 5%. These scenarios described above attempt to broadly illustrate just a few of the useful ways that a switch with Self-Learning IP can be deployed.

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