METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR SEAMLESS SCTP FAILOVER BETWEEN SCTP SERVERS RUNNING ON DIFFERENT MACHINES

摘要

A Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) cluster of multiple SCTP-servers is defined in such manner that some of the servers are assigned Active Role where others are assigned Standby Role with the purpose of ensuring uninterrupted SCTP-connections between the SCTP-cluster and any number of SCTP-clients. The Standby Servers use the same Internet Protocol (IP)-address(es) on the SCTP bound interfaces as their assigned Active Server. The Active Servers are effectively communicating to the SCTP-clients, where the Standby Servers are communicating to their assigned Active SCTP-Server using a separate backchannel TCP-connection. Over that backchannel connection the Standby Server receives regular updates from the Active Server. These updates hold enough information so that the Standby Server could locally simulate SCTP-negotiations and create SCTP-associations as if the SCTP-negotiations were performed directly with the SCTP-Clients. In this manner the Standby Servers are fully synchronized and ready in case of an Active Server failure to continue the SCTP-communications without any interruption. This handover does not involve any subsequent action from the SCTP-clients so that the SCTP-clients are unaware that such a handover took place.