CPC H04L 45/74 (2013.01) [H04L 12/66 (2013.01); H04L 45/24 (2013.01); H04L 67/141 (2013.01); H04L 45/04 (2013.01); H04L 47/828 (2013.01); H04L 49/602 (2013.01); H04L 67/1089 (2013.01); H04L 67/2885 (2013.01)] | 20 Claims |
1. A method of providing consistent next hop ordering when forwarding packets through a multi-tier network, the method comprising:
establishing, by each of a set of network devices in a first tier of the multi-tier network, a routing protocol session with other network devices in the multi-tier network;
obtaining, after the establishing, routing protocol information from the other network devices of the multi-tier network;
determining, by each of the set of the network devices in the first tier of the multi-tier network, using the routing protocol information, a group of the network devices in a second tier of the multi-tier network;
generating, by each of the set of the network devices in the first tier of the multi-tier network, a deterministic ordered group listing using network device identifiers (NDIs) for the network devices in the group of network devices; and
programming, by each of the set of the network devices in the first tier of the multi-tier network, corresponding network device hardware of each of the set of the network devices using the ordered group listing.
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