Importance

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Abstract

The invention provides a control mechanism that enables a destination router to authenticate response time requests issued by a source router before providing the requests to service software for processing. The control mechanism comprises a Network Endpoint Control Protocol (NECP) message format that is exchanged between the source and destination routers when measuring response time throughout the network. The NECP message format encapsulates a Command Length Status Data (CLSD) message that actually holds the response time requests. A collector router issues a novel control message to a responder router over a default responder port. If the responder is enabled for encryption communication, it will decrypt the control message according to the specified key and algorithm. If the responder is not so configured, it will check a conventional ACL to determine whether the client is authorized to communicate with the server. If permitted, the responder then responds to the collector in a manner dependent upon the particular protocol. In the case of a request to enable a UDP port for a particular time period, the responder processes a request and then sends back an acknowledgment to the collector. The collector receives the acknowledgment and then sends out a UDP probe packet to the responder. The responder then 'echoes' the packet back to the collector, which keeps the result.

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First Claim