ARRANGEMENT IN A ROUTER FOR DISTRIBUTING A ROUTING RULE USED TO GENERATE ROUTES BASED ON A PATTERN OF A RECEIVED PACKET

摘要

A router is configured for sharing routing rules with other routers, the routing rules defining aggregated routes according to a prescribed topology. Each routing rule, used by the router for routing a packet having a corresponding matching destination address prefix, specifies a corresponding address prefix pattern rule for extracting an identified pattern from a portion of the destination address, and a gateway address pattern rule for generating a gateway address, for a gateway providing reachability to the destination address, based on applying the identified pattern to a specified portion of the gateway address. The router generates a routing update message that describes the address prefix pattern rule and the gateway address pattern rule, and outputs the routing update message to a second router according to a prescribed distance vector routing protocol (e.g., Multiprotocol Extension for Border Gateway Protocol).