Patent ID: 9621484
Date: 2017-04-11
CPC Classifications: H04L

Claim:
1. A method for supporting packet switching in a network environment, the method comprising: associating an input port of a network device with a plurality of source virtual lanes (VLs); maintaining, by an ingress buffer on the networking device, a credit state for each of a plurality of virtual output queues (VOQs) of the ingress buffer, wherein each VOQ comprises resources of a shared memory, and wherein the credit state includes a current buffer occupancy based on how full the resources of the VOQ are; associating a first source VL of the plurality of source VLs with a first VOQ of the plurality of VOQs; storing a packet received at the input port in the in the first VOQ; releasing at least part of the resources of the first VOQ by de-queuing the packet stored in the first VOQ; reallocating at least part of the released VOQ resources of the first VOQ to a second VOQ of the plurality of VOQs associated with a second source VL of the plurality of source VLs; and sending an initial credit update to the input port for the first source VL and the second source VL, wherein the initial credit update reflects changes to the credit state of the first VOQ and the second VOQ caused by the reallocating.