Virtual addresses for action memories of a hardware forwarding element

A hardware forwarding element comprising:

• a set of dataplane match-action stages, wherein a particular dataplane match-action stage comprises:
• a first pool of unit memories for implementing a plurality of match entries, each of which comprises a set of match conditions and an address for an action entry to read when the set of match conditions are met by packets processed by the dataplane match-action stage;
• and
• a second pool of unit memories for implementing a plurality of action entries that each specify one or more actions to perform on the packets processed by the match-action stage, wherein each unit memory in the second pool comprises a set of action entries that are collectively assigned a virtual memory address, wherein the addresses specified by the match entries reference the virtual memory addresses of the action entries such that when a particular packet matches the match conditions of a particular match entry, the match-action stage (i) reads the particular action entry at the address specified by the particular match entry and (ii) performs the one or more actions specified by the particular action entry on the particular packet,
• wherein when a particular set of action entries from a first unit memory in the second pool of the particular dataplane match-action stage are moved to a second unit memory in the second pool of the particular dataplane match-action stage the particular set of action entries retains a same virtual memory address after moving to the second unit memory such that the addresses specified by a particular set of match entries that reference the particular set of action entries in the first unit memory using the virtual memory address prior to the moving of the particular set of action entries continue to reference the particular set of action entries in the second unit memory using the same virtual memory address after the moving of the particular set of action entries without modification of the match entries of the particular set of match entries.