Meshed tree bridging protocol (MTBP) ensures that bridged network constituents receive high reliability in frame delivery in the event of link or bridge failures. MTBP is based on the meshed tree algorithm (MTA) that allows for simultaneous construction and maintenance of multiple trees or tree branches from a single root. In the event of tree branch failures due to link or bridge failures, another preconstructed and maintained branch exists as an immediate fallback. Recovery and tree pruning times in meshed tree bridging is minimal. Multiple roots should be preassigned to construct multiple distinguishable meshed trees from each root. In the event of a root...

The scope of this document is as follows: a) In bridged networks running MTBP, ports shall be identified as either a meshed tree port that participates in the meshed tree resolution, or a host port, to which a local host is connected. Only meshed tree ports are allowed to participate in the meshed tree resolution. b) MTBP provides superior fault tolerance by preconfiguring several logical trees from a root. One of these logical trees is considered the primary tree and is used for forwarding broadcast frames. In the event of a network component failure and immediately on failure detection of the primary branch, broadcast frame forwarding is taken over by any ...

The purpose of this standard is to specify the methods for establishing several tree-like structures on an existing topology. The protocol leverages any useable path rather than eliminating possible alternate links. Upon changes to the topology, the meshed tree protocol will converge in zero time through the immediate use of alternate predetermined viable pathways on failure detection. MTBP allows for maintenance of multiple active topologies by adopting the MTA (described in Clause 5). The concept of meshed trees is novel in that they do not use the traditionally prevailing concept of a single tree from one root. They allow for multiple trees or subtrees to...