Aricent PIM (Protocol Independent Multicast) is a portable software implementation of PIM (Sparse Mode and Dense Mode) as per IETF draft-ietf-pim-sm-v2-new-05.ps for Sparse Mode and draft-ietf-pim-v2-dm-03.txt for Dense Mode. Aricent PIM provides support for inter-domain routing between domains using PIM-SM or PIM-DM.

Aricent PIM is designed to provide scalable inter-domain multicast routing across the Internet. It also avoids the performance problems of the earlier multicast routing protocols. This software provides multicast routing and forwarding capability to a router that runs the IP protocol along with IGMP. Aricent PIM routes multicast data packets independent of any Unicast routing protocol.

Figure 1. Aricent PIM in a Software
based Router Architecture.


Figure 2. Aricent PIM in a Hardware
Forwarding based Router Architecture

Operation:

SM Operation is employed in environments where group members are sparsely distributed throughout the network and bandwidth is a constraint. For example, across many regions of the Internet or if users are connected via ISDN lines.

DM Operation is employed in networks where receivers are densely populated in the network. It operates in a flood and prune approach. Multicast trees are built by the data sent from the source.

Features:

• Includes a multicast forwarding engine with clear separation between the control (routing) and multicast forwarding planes.
• Provides support for inter-domain routing between PIM-SM and PIM-DM.
• Provides support for multiple components where each component can act in either dense or sparse mode.
• Implements the Reverse Path Forwarding (RPF) algorithm.
• Builds and maintains the Rendezvous Point (RP), rooted shared trees (Multicast delivery trees) using periodic and triggered Join/ Prune messages.
• Supports switching from RP tree to SP (Shortest Path) tree when a particular source generates heavy traffic.
• Adapts to Unicast route changes.
• Provides support for configuration as BSR, and propagates RP-Set information into the network.
• Confines to the IETF standards in RP and BSR elections.
• Allows configuration as C-RP, and informs the CRP information periodically to the BSR of the domain.
• Supports configuration as Candidate-RP independently on each interface.
• Supports regular housekeeping functions such as Neighbor Discovery and timeout.
• Supports Operation under multi-access networks by suppressing and overriding of join/prunes and electing a single forwarder through Asserts in both sparse and dense modes. Supports operation over point-to-point interfaces.
• Supports Graft messages and Graft acknowledgement messages for faster convergence in a dense mode network.
• Allows interoperability between components using the rules specified in RFC2715. Further, each component can also function independently, which indicates complete separation between the components.
• Supports Prune Rate-limiting in case of dense mode operation.
• Provides well-defined APIs to interface with any IP/IGMP router software.
• Provides open interfaces for management using SNMP, CLI or other management software.
• Provides clear interfaces to use hardware chipsets for multicast forwarding in case of dense mode operation.
• Implements the Generation Identifier (GenID), which is required to rebuild the Multicast forwarding state, when a router goes offline and restarts.
• Conforms to Future Software Architecture for Portability (FSAP2), thus ensuring highly portable code that uses flexible buffer and timer management libraries.
• Integrates easily in a system that supports BSD compliant socket (e.g. Linux, FreeBSD) with the usage of standard socket calls for packet transmission and reception.

Aricent PIM reduces the time to market for OEMs and VARs who wish to incorporate the PIM functionality into their switching/routing devices.

Other Offerings ------------------------------------------- Protocol Stacks ------------------------------------------- .... WLAN ---- 802.11i ---- 802.11F ------------------------------------------- .... IPV4 ---- IP ---- TCP ---- DNS Relay ---- IGMPv3 ------------------------------------------- .... IPv6 ---- IPv6 Host ---- IPv6 Router ---- V6R - IPv6 Routing ------------------------------------------- .... Unicast Routing ---- RIP ---- OSPF ---- OSPF-TE ---- BGP4 ---- BGP4+ ---- ISIS ------------------------------------------- .... Multicast Routing ---- PIM ---- DVMRP ------------------------------------------- .... Label Switching ---- MPLS ------------------------------------------- .... Layer2 Switching ---- VLAN (GARP, GVRP) ---- RSTP/MSTP ---- Link Aggregation ---- 802.1x ---- IGMP Snooping ------------------------------------------- .... Layer2 Switching-Multiple Instance ---- RSTP/MSTP - MI ---- VLAN - MI (GARP, GVRP) ------------------------------------------- .... Security ---- NAT ---- FIREWALL ---- DHCP ---- IPSec ---- IKE ---- RADIUS ---- TACACS+ ---- 802.1x ------------------------------------------- .... Quality Of Service ---- RSVP ---- QOS ------------------------------------------- .... Fault Tolerance ---- VRRP ---- RM ------------------------------------------- .... Management ---- SNMP ---- ENM ---- HTTP ---- RMON ---- WEB NM ------------------------------------------- .... VPN ---- L2TP ---- PPP ---- IPSec ------------------------------------------- .... WAN Access ---- L2TP ---- PPP ---- FRPVC ---- FRATM ------------------------------------------- .... Narrowband ---- V5.2 ---- ISUP ---- MTP3 ------------------------------------------- .... Optical ---- RM ------------------------------------------- .... ATM ---- UNI3 ---- UNI4 ---- IPOA ---- PNNI ---- LANE2-C ---- LANE2-S ---- MPOA-C ---- MPOA-S ---- ILMI4 ------------------------------------------- ...MORE... ------------------------------------------- OEM Ready Solutions ------------------------------------------- .... Intelligent Switch ---- ISS Overview ---- ISS Enterprise ---- ISS Workgroup ------------------------------------------- .... Enhanced Security Solution ------------------------------------------- ...MORE...