Proceedings of the SMART–2020, IEEE Conference ID: 50582

9th International Conference on System Modeling & Advancement in Research Trends, 4th–5th, December, 2020
Faculty of Engineering & Computing Sciences, Teerthanker Mahaveer University, Moradabad, India

Augmenting Border Gateway Protocol with

Multi-protocol Label Switching for Enhancing
2020 9th International Conference System Modeling and Advancement in Research Trends (SMART) | 978-1-7281-8908-6/20/$31.00 ©2020 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/SMART50582.2020.9337076

Network Path Restoration

Vidhu Baggan*, Pradeepta Kumar Sarangi, Devendra Prasad and Jyoti Snehi
Chitkara University Institute of Engineering and Technology, Chitkara University, Punjab, India
*E-mail: vidhu.baggan @chitkara.edu.in

Abstract—Network routing depends primarily on
connectivity, which demands the insurance from protocol
standards that even if one network path disconnects, the
alternate path should be available in no time with minimum
packet loss. The Network Path Restoration (NPR) mechanism
is required after any link/node failure occurs in a network.
These failures are frequent in core networks and must be
handled in a quick and efficient manner with minimum packet
loss. In this paper, it is proposed that augmenting Border
Gateway Protocol (BGP) with Multiprotocol Label Switching
(MPLS) technology can enhance the NPR mechanism with
minimum packet loss. This research work made a significant
contribution to NPR. In this study, hybridization of approaches
have been performed to design a new mechanism for NPR.
Keywords NPR, BGP, MPLS.
I. Introduction
In contemporary world, Internet connectivity is
becoming the spinal chord of our digital lives. Since the
inception of computer networks, many new domains of
connectivity have made their way into our day to day life.
Addition of so many new domains of connectivity have been
putting tremendous load on existing network infrastructure
which at times lead to links not working as per expectation.
Under such conditions, path restoration in the minimum
possible time remains a major challenge for the researchers.
This paper discusses the importance of NPR arises
from the fact that the network traffic which is supposed to
move through the broken link has to follow an alternate or
backup path for reaching its destination network.
Researchers are jaded in designing different techniques,
upon which the decision of selection of backup path depends.
Approaches like sending the packets of information back
to the source and rerouting to an alternate/backup path
have been worked upon by some of the researchers.[1].
This approach is simple to implement but has overlooked
the fact regarding availability of that resources. The route
selected must consider the bandwidth of the backup path
before making the transition of paths [2-3]. As the backup
path can be selected at the time of network establishment
which will reduce the resource overhead.But this selected
back up path must be in synchronization with the current
306 Copyright © IEEE–2020 ISBN: 978-1-7281-8908-6
status of the network traffic [4].These considerations will
lead to achieve Quality of Service (QoS). Based on this
technique plethora of approaches were devised and among
them few suggested techniques after amalgamation of
already established mechanisms to lessen the recovery time
[5-7]. On the path to fast restoration, in a topology, the
location of a link-failure plays a significant role [8]. The
study professed that if the faulty network elements can be
identified quickly, the link failures can be resolved in less
time and more resources will be available for future traffic
needs. Out of the many studies conducted, one innovation
is remarkable; it introduced the concept of directory server
[9]. In this approach no router will select the alternate path
and one directory server will be there to take such decisions.
Hence, basic functionality of routers would not be affected.
This technique paved the way for future technologies. The
studies also propounded ideas from already developed
schemes for achieving QoS [10-15].
To achieve quick restoration time, the study of
network congestion control mechanisms is also needed.
With the support of technologies like Asynchronous
Transmission Mode (ATM) and frame relay, the congestion
can be prevented or corrected [16-17].Since the proposed
mechanism must possess the technology at the back-
end that can support and attain the required parameters
and MPLS appears to be the best option or the most
suitable one.
Therefore, in this research work, key techniques used
to overcome the challenges of NPR and fast recovery
were MPLS and BGP. MPLS is as a technique has been
researched for quite a number of years now to 1994.This
study went on to achieve the quick restoration time with
swapping of labels.
MPLS is a mechanism in which the destination address
of every network packet is not checked in its complete
form at every hop/router. The routers in the network path
assigns label to the packet and sends it to the next router.
The complete address of the packet is checked only at
the destination router known as egress router [18]. In
this technique the prime concern is to improve network

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 Augmenting Border Gateway Protocol with Multi-protocol Label Switching for Enhancing Network Path Restoration

speed and there is a trade-off between speed and security. to route packets. It is considered as a Hybrid protocol,
Networks based on MPLS technology is equipped with which possesses the advantages of Distance vector routing
many features to deal with the delay sensitive traffic like protocol and Link state routing protocol. The EIGRP uses
Traffic Engineering (TE) [19]. MPLS-TE provides efficient following metrics for the selection of the best route:
bandwidth utilization as it shifts the network traffic from 1. Bandwidth
overloaded paths to alternate paths with free bandwidth. 2. Delay
The Multi Protocol Label Switching along with traffic 3. Throughput
engineering provides bandwidth management to service 4. Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU)
providers at a reasonable cost [20].. Because of its attractive 5. Load
features and easy implementation, this core network 6. Reliability
technology has become the most preferred choice of the The topology is also configured with MPLS commands
service provider as well as customers. for Cisco routers. Similarly, for Inter-Autonomous System
Similarly, techniques like BGP can be helpful in or Inter-domain routing, BGP protocol is used. An
eliminating the challenges of the network. BGP version 4 is independent organization (AS) is a group of interconnected
a path–vector routing protocol equipped with the anti-loop route, generally under one administration following a
mechanism. The BGP speaking routers exchange routing routing policy. The IANA assigns a unique id of 32 integers
updates information with other BGP speakers and the path to the AS. The ASes are connected through serial links with
selection is based upon the policy based routing which a bandwidth capacity of 1.544 Mbps. Fig. 1 depicts the
consists of local preferences, the number of hops in terms of topology simulated in GNS3.
Autonomous Systems and the multiple exit discriminator.
But there are some challenges in BGP that procedure of
selecting best path metrics leads to slow convergence. In
addition to this, during a network failure, BGP may swap
the route entries repeatedly from the routing table to reach
a stable state in a network. During this state, multiple
announcements may occur.
Number of researches have been done so far to mitigate
the convergence delay in BGP, a study presented the
following three modifications in the algorithm of BGP.
1. Extend BGP update message to record information.
2. Select paths based on the information stored in the
extended BGP update message.
3. Monitor and update the state of the advertised
route.
Therefore this research work, integrated two approaches
together to overcome the challenge of NPR, that is BGP
Fig. 1: Network Topology in GNS3 for MPLS + BGP Network
when implemented with MPLS performs remarkably good.
Architecture
MPLS integrates the best of both IP and circuit exchanging
and does what ATM and Frame Relay cannot achieve alone B. GNS3
and is known for achieving quick restoration time while The Graphical Network Simulator-3 (GNS3) was first
BGP being as the widely used enhanced gateway protocol released in 2008 as a network software emulator. The GNS3
(EGP) can cover up the entire large network of networks is capable of emulating route and input in the network,
efficiently with minimum packet loss. as well as incorporating real and simulated devices and
connecting them through a rational network.
II. Design and Implementation
C. Results through Wireshark
Implementation of MPLS with BGP on GNS3 is
The BGP speaker will exchange routes among BGP
performed and its result is observed by the sniffing tool,
peers and will exchange five types of messages. The
Wireshark. To understand the role of MPLS and BGP better,
following screenshot of Wireshark depicting OPEN
both are configured on the same topology in sequence.
MESSAGE exchange is shown in Fig. 2.
A. Topology The proposed mechanism must increase the use of
The topology is composed of six routers, four resources, set up a retrieval path comparatively quickly, and
autonomous systems (AS) named as AS 100, AS200,AS300 supporting almost every types of failures, like as as connection
and AS 400. For Intra-domain routing, network uses fails, node failures, failures on equally the occupied way and
Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP) its recovery path, and simultaneous failures.
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9th International Conference on System Modeling & Advancement in Research Trends, 4th–5th December, 2020
Faculty of Engineering & Computing Sciences, Teerthanker Mahaveer University, Moradabad, India
Fig. 2: OPEN Message Sent to a BGP Peer
III. Results and Discussions
The result professes that the proposed mechanism
suffers less delay, jitter, and high throughput as compared to
existing mechanisms. The graphs shown in Fig. 3, Fig. 4 and
Fig. 5 for Round Trip Time, Throughput and I/O graph (in
Wireshark) for BGP and MPLS, depicts that an integrated
approach of both technologies delivers a number of frames
in less time. This result affirms for the assimilation of BGP
and MPLS.
Fig. 3: Round Trip Time for BGP and MPLS+BGP packets for Network
Topology in GNS3
Fig. 4: Throughput for BGP and MPLS+BGP packets for Network
Topology in GNS3
308
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Fig. 5: Packets Received Per Sec for MPLS+BGP, for Network
Topology in GNS3
This work made a significant contribution to NPR.
In this study, hybridization of approaches have been
performed to design a new mechanism for NPR. It has
been inferred that the network design must be accessible
and strong to ensure self-reliance, in case of a network
failure. In addition to this, no single mechanism can handle
the dynamicity of the Internet. It must be supported by a
number of mechanisms.
IV. AnalYsis of tHe Results
This section shows the analysis of the work performed.
In Fig. 6 the analysis of a captured packet from a topology
configured with BGP and MPLS. The message shown
in green strips depicts the protocol ‘Label Distribution
Protocol’ (LDP). The LDP is the protocol for MPLS
while Fig. 7 shows the I/O graph in Wireshark. This graph
captures the number of packets per second.
Fig. 6: Network Packet Analysis in Wireshark
Copyright © IEEE–2020 ISBN: 978-1-7281-8908-6
 Augmenting Border Gateway Protocol with Multi-protocol Label Switching for Enhancing Network Path Restoration
Fig. 7: I/O Graph Through Wireshark
V. Conclusion
There is no mechanism available that guarantee
an alternate pathway with 0% data loss and similarly no
mechanism guarantee minimum delay during switching to
alternate path except the mechanism that demanded 100%
additional bandwidth.
The advantages of MPLS are versatility, better
transmission capacity usage, reducing system network
congestion, and also a superior end-user experiencing.
MPLS does not possess an inbuilt feature for security.
However, being a virtual private system and in that capacity
is divided off from the public Internet of things. With this
dimension, MPLS is considered as a secure mechanism.
On the other side, MPLS is the method that emphasize
the main network and more costly in terms of bandwidth
reservation. The MPLS system network used for the
deployment and sending the recognised approach for the
actual traffic load.
Moreover, BGP is the defacto protocol to exchange
routing information among them. The network convergence
takes place, whenever any of the following events occurs:
1. Introduction of new network
2. Modification in routing policies
3. Link or node failure
During any of the above state of routing instability,
packet and QoS loss may occur. This research work utilized
both the mechanisms to lessen the problem of restoring the
network path along with minimum packet loss.
VI. Future Work
NPR is a complex area of research. In this work, sincere
attempts have been made to analyse the existing methods of
path restoration and subsequently, a new optimized method
has been proposed. Though all efforts have been made
to propose a better approach still the work can further be
improved by customizing BGP and MPLS applications and
designing new network architectures.
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