US 12,323,291 B2
Managing network ports in a virtualization environment
Ryan Robert Howard, Bothell, WA (US)
Assigned to F5, Inc., Seattle, WA (US)
Filed by F5 Networks, Inc., Seattle, WA (US)
Filed on Aug. 11, 2020, as Appl. No. 16/990,099.
Prior Publication US 2022/0052904 A1, Feb. 17, 2022
Int. Cl. H04L 41/0654 (2022.01); G06F 9/455 (2018.01); H04L 12/46 (2006.01); H04L 47/41 (2022.01)
CPC H04L 41/0654 (2013.01) [G06F 9/45558 (2013.01); H04L 12/4641 (2013.01); H04L 47/41 (2013.01); G06F 2009/45595 (2013.01)] 16 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method implemented by a network traffic management system comprising one or more network traffic management apparatuses, server devices, or client devices, the method comprising:
bonding a plurality of physical network ports into a link aggregation group accessible from a network interface using a virtual bonding interface of a network interface device that segregates port bundling functionality from an operating system of a host computer such that the host operating system of the host computer is not aware of the link aggregation group;
assigning a device function of the network interface device to a virtual machine, the device function used for communicating between the network interface and the virtual machine via an interconnect of the host computer, the virtual machine executing on the host computer;
using the device function to forward network traffic between the virtual machine and the network interface, and across the link aggregation group; and
without using operating system control, controlling an existing amount of bandwidth provided across the link aggregation group for network packets associated with the device function.