Network-wide BGP route prediction for traffic engineering

Nick Feamster; Jennifer Rexford

doi:10.1117/12.475284

8 July 2002 Network-wide BGP route prediction for traffic engineering

Nick Feamster, Jennifer Rexford

Proceedings Volume 4868, Scalability and Traffic Control in IP Networks II; (2002) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.475284
Event: ITCom 2002: The Convergence of Information Technologies and Communications, 2002, Boston, MA, United States

Abstract

The Internet consists of about 13,000 Autonomous Systems (AS's) that exchange routing information using the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP). The operators of each AS must have control over the flow of traffic through their network and between neighboring AS's. However, BGP is a complicated, policy-based protocol that does not include any direct support for traffic engineering. In previous work, we have demonstrated that network operators can adapt the flow of traffic in an efficient and predictable fashion through careful adjustments to the BGP policies running on their edge routers. Nevertheless, many details of the BGP protocol and decision process make predicting the effects of these policy changes difficult. In this paper, we describe a tool that predicts traffic flow at network exit points based on the network topology, the import policy associated with each BGP session, and the routing advertisements received from neighboring AS's. We present a linear-time algorithm that computes a network-wide view of the best BGP routes for each destination prefix given a static snapshot of the network state, without simulating the complex details of BGP message passing. We describe how to construct this snapshot using the BGP routing tables and router configuration files available from operational routers. We verify the accuracy of our algorithm by applying our tool to routing and configuration data from AT&T's commercial IP network. Our route prediction techniques help support the operation of large IP backbone networks, where interdomain routing is an important aspect of traffic engineering.

Citation Download Citation

Nick Feamster and Jennifer Rexford "Network-wide BGP route prediction for traffic engineering", Proc. SPIE 4868, Scalability and Traffic Control in IP Networks II, (8 July 2002); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.475284

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