Juniper Networks, Inc.
Detecting hardware address conflicts in computer networks

Abstract:

In general, techniques are described for detecting duplicate hardware addresses in network devices of a computer network. A network device sends a request message on a network, the request message specifying the range of hardware addresses starting from the target hardware address. A network device determines whether at least a subset of the range of hardware addresses starting from the target hardware address is available based on response messages received from other network devices. The network device then reserves the available addresses for assigning to virtual machines (VMs) executing on the network device.