Methods and apparatus to route packets in a policy driven networked environment

A method of routing a packet of information in a networked environment comprising:

• representing relationships between a plurality of properties and a plurality of routing policies with a plurality of bit vectors;
• identifying a first property value associated with the packet and a second property value associated with the packet;
• selecting a first bit vector from the plurality of bit vectors based on the first property value;
• selecting a second bit vector from the plurality of bit vectors based on the second property value;
• determining an intersection of the first and second bit vectors;
• identifying at least one of the plurality of routing policies to be used to route the packet based on the intersection of the first and second bit vectors;
• and
• representing a wildcard policy by a bit vector, wherein identifying the at least one of the plurality of routing policies to be used to route the packet based on the intersection of the first and second bit vectors comprises:
• performing a logical OR operation on (a) the bit vector representing the wildcard policy and (b) the intersection of the first and second bit vectors;
• and
• identifying the at least one of the plurality of routing policies from a bit vector resulting from the logical OR operation.

An computer readable medium storing machine readable instructions which, when executed, cause a machine to:

• use a first property value associated with a packet of information to identify a first bit vector;
• use a second property value associated with the packet of information to identify a second bit vector;
• identify at least one routing policy from the first and second bit vectors for routing the packet of information in a networked environment;
• and
• represent a wildcard policy by a bit vector, wherein the machine readable instructions further cause the machine to identify the at least one routing policy by:
• performing a logical OR operation on (a) the bit vector representing the wildcard policy and (b) an intersection of the first and second bit vectors;
• and
• identifying the at least one routing policy from a bit vector resulting from the logical OR operation.

A method of identifying at least one routing policy applicable to a packet of information comprising:

• identifying a first property value associated with a first property and a second property value associated with a second property, the first and second property values being associated with the packet of information;
• searching a first binary tree associated with the first property to retrieve a first bit vector associated with the first property value;
• searching a second binary tree associated with the second property to retrieve a second bit vector associated with the second property value;
• and
• identifying at least one routing policy based on the first and second bit vectors.