US 12,335,311 B2
Stateful media access control security switchover support
Sourav Basu, Hooghly (IN); Tarun Jaswanth, Bangalore (IN); Kaustav Majumdar, Bangalore (IN); and Manish Singhvi, Jodhpur (IN)
Assigned to ARISTA NETWORKS, INC., Santa Clara, CA (US)
Filed by Arista Networks, Inc., Santa Clara, CA (US)
Filed on Jun. 8, 2022, as Appl. No. 17/835,633.
Prior Publication US 2023/0403303 A1, Dec. 14, 2023
Int. Cl. H04L 9/40 (2022.01); H04L 9/08 (2006.01)
CPC H04L 63/20 (2013.01) [H04L 9/0838 (2013.01); H04L 63/162 (2013.01)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method for managing a group of secured network devices that implement a secured network communication protocol, the method comprising:
detecting, by a switchover agent operating in a secured network device of the group of secured network devices, a switchover between a first supervisor and a second supervisor, wherein the first and second supervisors are part of the secured network device, and wherein the switchover causes the first supervisor to transition from an active state that involves managing one or more components of the secured network device to a standby state and causes the second supervisor to transition from the standby state to the active state; and
in response to detecting the switchover between the first supervisor and the second supervisor:
generating a modified heartbeat packet, wherein the modified heartbeat packet comprises a suspension time that is representative of an amount of time needed for the switchover to be completed and indicates, to a second secured network device of the group of secured network devices, a time period during which the second secured network device suspends one or more operations pertaining to the secured network communication protocol, and
sending the modified heartbeat packet to the second secured network device.