System and method for implementing a generic enhanced network driver
OwnerRoger Wiles, Timothy Michalsinventors
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Abstract
A software package for operating on a network including a plurality of network hardware devices comprises at least one networking protocols to transmit and receive data packets over the network, a hardware device driver coupled to the network hardware devices, an enhanced network driver coupled to the hardware device driver to transmit and receive the data packets using the network hardware devices and a control interface to transmit and receive control information to and from the hardware device driver. The enhanced network driver and control interface being portable to multiple network hardware devices.
Claims20
1-32. canceled
A network switch, comprising:
- a look-up table;
- and
- an enhanced network driver receiving a first data packet received by the network switch from a network device and determining a port number of the network switch which received the first data packet and an address of the network device from the first data packet, the enhanced network driver storing the port number and the corresponding address in the look-up table, and wherein the enhanced network driver, when receiving a second data packet to be transmitted to the network device, determines the port number from which the second data packet is transmitted based on the address included in the second data packet and the corresponding port number stored in the look-up table for the address.
A network device, comprising:
- an enhanced network driver receiving a data packet from upper level layers, inserting a source address in the data packet and determining the destination address for the data packet, the enhanced network driver being independent of any hardware services for the network device;
- and
- a control interface communicating control information from the upper level layers to a hardware device driver, the control interface being independent of any data packets in the network device and including a plurality of object definitions.
A method for processing a data packet, comprising the steps of:
- receiving the data packet at a hardware device driver;
- passing the data packet to an enhanced network driver, the enhanced network driver being independent of any hardware device functionality;
- processing the data packet by the enhanced network driver, the processing including the determining of a source address of the data packet and a port number of a hardware device which received the data packet;
- storing the source address and the corresponding port number in a look-up table;
- identifying a protocol type of the data packet;
- and
- passing the data packet to an upper level layer based on the identified protocol type.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.