Segment Routing Microloop Avoidance Demo

Microloops are transient packet loops that occur in the network following a topology change. They are caused by the non-simultaneous convergence of different nodes in the network and result in packet loss, jitter, out-of-order packets. The traffic steering capabilities of Segment Routing allow to prevent such microloops to occur for link down, link up and metric change events. The Microloop Avoidance functionality detects if microloops are possible following a topology change. If microloops could occur, then it steers the traffic on the final post-convergence path through the network, but on a path that is guaranteed loopfree thanks to the Segment Routing steering. The regular forwarding entries are updated when no more microloops are possible. Microloop Avoidance functionality is simple to deploy in the Segment Routing enabled network. It is a local behaviour based on the regular routing protocol database and computations, no additional signalling is required.