Distributed switch systems in a trill network

A method for managing a plurality of network devices in a Transparent Interconnection of Lots of Links (TRILL)-compliant network to operate as a distributed switch system, comprising:

• adding at an ingress network device a distributed switch parameter to a TRILL data packet;
• outputting the TRILL data packet to an egress network device;
• and
• determining from the distributed switch parameter an instruction, wherein the egress network device is part of a same distributed switch as the ingress device, and wherein the egress network device complies with the instruction, the method further comprising:
• synchronizing a hash computation of a data flow related to the TRILL data packet among network devices of the distributed switch that include the ingress network device and the egress network device for determining an output port for the data flow.

A computer program product for providing a distributed switch system (DSS) in a TRILL-compliant network, the computer program product comprising:

• a computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therewith, the computer readable program code comprising;
• computer readable program code configured to provide by an ingress network device in the TRILL-compliant network data to a received packet, the data including instructions related to a feature of the DSS, the instructions inserted into a TRILL header generated at the ingress network device;
• computer readable program code configured to output the TRILL header to an egress network device in the TRILL-compliant network;
• computer readable program code configured to determining whether the ingress network device and the egress network device are members of the DSS;
• and
• computer readable program code configured to process the instructions by the egress network device in response to determining that ingress and egress devices are members of the DSS, wherein the DSS synchronizes a hash computation of the data between the ingress network device and the egress network device for determining an output port for the data.