VIRO: A scalable, robust and namespace independent virtual Id routing for future networks

Sourabh Jain, Yingying Chen, Zhi-Li Zhang

Abstract: In this paper we propose VIRO - a novel, virtual identifier (Id) routing paradigm for future networks. The objective is three-fold. First, VIRO directly addresses the challenges faced by the traditional layer-2 technologies such as Ethernet, while retaining its simplicity feature. Second, it provides a uniform convergence layer that integrates and unifies routing and forwarding performed by the traditional layer-2 and layer-3, as prescribed by the traditional local-area/wide-area network dichotomy. Third and perhaps more importantly, VIRO decouples routing from addressing, and thus is namespace-independent. The key idea in our design is to introduce a topology-aware, structured virtual id (vid) space onto which both physical identifiers as well as higher layer addresses/names are mapped. VIRO completely eliminates network-wide flooding in both the data and control planes, and thus is highly scalable and robust. Furthermore, VIRO effectively localizes failures, and possesses built-in mechanisms for fast rerouting and load-balancing.