Balanced Spanning Tree Protocol in Hierarchical NextGen Ethernet Networks

Creation and maintenance of the spanning tree forwarding topology is an essential task in Ethernet networks. In standard Ethernet networks, Spanning Tree Protocol (STP) is responsible to do this task. In STP, some links will be disabled to provide a minimum-cost spanning tree. However, the constructed tree may be unbalanced. STP does not provide any mechanism for load balancing, results in unbalanced distribution of the traffic load and this may lead to congestion. In this paper, a new protocol named Balanced Spanning Tree Protocol (BASTP) is proposed to provide a balanced spanning tree in hierarchical topologies for using in next generation (NextGen) wired networks. Simulation results show that BASTP provides better load balancing and therefore better performance in comparison to the standard STP.