US 2006/0153187 A1 · Fibre channel forwarding information base

Abstract

According to the present invention, methods and apparatus are provided to improve the techniques and mechanisms for forwarding packets at a fibre channel switch. A combined area table/domain table (ATDT) is accessed using destination information associated with a fibre channel packet. Area/port or domain information can be used to address entries in the ATDT. Each entry provides one or more paths to a given destination. Traffic shaping, load balancing, and other policy based forwarding considerations can be applied.

Claims28

Dependent claims

A method for efficiently forwarding a fibre channel packet at a fibre channel switch, the method comprising;

receiving a fibre channel packet, the fibre channel packet including a domain address and an area address;
referencing an entry in a combined area table domain table to determine one or more possible output paths;
forwarding the fibre channel packet along a selected output path.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Facts

Application

11/035,158Filed 12 Jan 2005

Published

13 Jul 2006

Term ends

Not estimatedThe source records don’t support an estimate.

Classification4 codes

H04L 45/00
Routing or path finding of packets in data switching networks
H04L 45/04
Topology update or discovery: interdomain routing, e.g. hierarchical routing
H04L 45/54
Routing or path finding of packets in data switching networks: organization of routing tables
H04L
Digital communication

Fibre channel forwarding information base

Life of this patent

Fibre channel forwarding information base

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims28