Method and apparatus for customizing and fowarding parameters in a network processor
AssigneeInternational Business Machines Corporation
InventorsClaude Basso, Natarajan Vaidhyanathan, Gail Irene Woodland
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Abstract
In a distributed networking environment employing several general purpose processors (i.e., control point processors) for controlling one or more network processor devices, a mechanism for distributing processing across several general purpose processors and interface for configuring a network processor so that specific general purpose processors handle specific operations in a large networking environment, thus, reducing requirement for provisioning a plurality of protocol stacks on each general purpose processor.
Claims9
A system for distributing processing of special data frames received by a network processor (NP) device in a distributed networking environment comprising one or more general purpose control processors (GPP) that control one or more NP devices, said system comprising;
- a configurable table implemented in said NP device for mapping special data frame types received at said NP device with a target address and a target port address associated with a target GPP capable of handling said special frame type;
- an application programming interface for customizing said configurable table in said NP device with said target address and target port address entries through said GPP,
- wherein said NP device includes mechanism for classifying the received data frames and comparing each said frame to entries in said configurable table, and if said classified frame type has a corresponding entry in said table, said NP device forwarding said frame to said target GPP through a corresponding target port address, wherein said target GPP is provisioned for handling forwarding of said special data frame type.
A method for distributing processing of special data frames received by a network processor (NP) device in a distributed networking environment comprising one or more general purpose control processors (GPP) that control one or more NP devices, said method comprising:
- a) providing a table implemented in said NP device for mapping special data frame types received at said NP device with a target address and a target port address associated with a target GPP capable of processing said special frame type,
- b) receiving at said NP device a data frame of a data frame type;
- c) classifying the received data frames and comparing each said frame to entries in said table;
- and,
- d) if said classified frame type has a corresponding entry in said table, forwarding said special data frame to said target GPP through a corresponding target port address, said target GPP provisioned for handling forwarding of said special data frame type,
- wherein step a) includes the step of:
- implementing an application programming interface for configuring said table with said target address and a target port address.
An application programming interface for configuring a network processor (NP) device operating in a distributed networking environment including one or more general purpose control processors (GPP) that control one or more NP devices, said interface comprising:
- a mechanism for generating a data structure for input to said NP device, said data structure having one or more entries specifying a special frame type and associated target address and target port address associated with a GPP in said networking environment capable of handling said special frame type;
- and,
- a device for generating a customized table from said generated data structure, and inputting said customized table to an NP device memory, whereby subsequent table lookups in said table are performed for forwarding special frame types to an associated GPP through a target port address.
A program storage device readable by a machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine to perform method steps for configuring a network processor (NP) device operating in a distributed networking environment including one or more general purpose control processors (GPP) that control one or more NP devices, said method steps comprising:
- (a) generating a data structure for input to said NP device, said data structure having one or more entries specifying a special frame type and associated target address and target port address associated with a GPP associated with said networking environment capable of handling said special frame type;
- and,
- (b) generating a customized table from said generated data structure, and inputting said table to NP device memory, whereby subsequent table lookups in said table are performed for forwarding special frame types to an associated GPP through a target port address.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.