Bridge apparatus and communication method

A bridge apparatus comprising:

• a first line card and a second line card,
• wherein the first line card includes:
• a first memory that stores an association between a line card to which a terminal apparatus is coupled and an address of the terminal apparatus, and
• a first processor that executes a program causing the first processor to perform
• adding, to a frame to be transmitted, a first flag indicating whether or not an address is stored in the first memory that matches a destination address of the frame, and
• transmitting, to the second line card, the frame to which the first flag is added,
• wherein the second line card includes:
• a second memory that stores an association between a line card to which another terminal apparatus is coupled and an address of the another terminal apparatus, and
• a second processor that executes a program causing the second process to perform
• receiving the frame transmitted from the first line card,
• determining whether or not an address stored in the second memory matches the destination address of the received frame, when the first flag added to the received frame indicates that the first memory does not store the destination address of the frame, and
• transmitting, upon determining that the address stored in the second memory matches the destination address of the received frame, address information associated with at least the destination address of the received frame to the first line card, the destination address being stored by the second memory.

A communication method comprising:

• receiving, by a line card, a frame transmitted from another line card, the frame including:
• destination address and a flag indicating whether or not a first memory associated with the another line card stored the same destination address as was in the received frame;
• extracting, by the line card, the destination address and the first flag in the received frame;
• when the first flag in the received frame indicates that the destination address in the received frame was not stored in the first memory associated with the another line card and the destination address extracted matched a destination address stored in a second memory of the line card then transmitting address information stored in the second memory to the another line card.