US 6,553,005 B1 · Method and apparatus for load apportionment among physical interfaces in data routers

Abstract

A method for routing a packet received in a packet router is taught, the method comprising the steps of selecting a logical interface having multiple physical ports as a destination for the packet, processing any one or more addresses or labels of the packet and other packets received by a common function, producing thereby results unique to the packets in which the addresses and labels processed differ, (c) mapping the physical ports at the destination to the unique results produced by processing the addresses or labels of packets, and (d) routing the data packet according to the mapping. Weighting is applied to physical ports in the mapping, the weighting reflecting different transmission capacities of the ports. Apparatus for practicing the invention is taught as well.

Claims14

Dependent claims

A method for routing packets in a packet router having a plurality of candidate egress ports for individual ones of the packets, the method comprising the steps of:

(a) using a common characteristic of each packet, choosing a set of egress ports from a table of sets of ports associated with said characteristic;
(b) processing a source/destination address pair of each packet using a hashing function, producing thereby a binary string result for each packet processed;
and
(c) using a default subset of the binary string result to select a single egress port for each packet from among the egress ports of the set chosen in step (a), ensuring thereby that packets having common source/destination address pairs egress by a common egress port.

1 more element

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Method and apparatus for load apportionment among physical interfaces in data routers

Life of this patent

Method and apparatus for load apportionment among physical interfaces in data routers

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims14