Patent ID: 6370584
Filing Date: 2002-04-09
Classification: G06F,H04L

Abstract:
Apparatus for responding to data units that are transmitted from source computers via a computer network, comprising:a router device for receiving said data units on behalf of a plurality of computer devices organized within a group, wherein said router device operates to distribute said data units among said plurality of computer devices, wherein each of said plurality of computer devices monitors connection establishment and termination between said source computers and each of said plurality of computer devices, and wherein each one of said plurality of computer devices is operable to receive those of said data units which are addressed to it, and wherein each one of said plurality of computer devices within said group is further operable to perform a distributed routing function to: process a first subset of said data units addressed to it by transmitting a response to at least one of said source computers in the event that predetermined criteria are satisfied; and reroute a second subset of said data units addressed to it to other ones of said computer devices organized within said group, without processing said second subset of said data units, to obtain a predetermined distribution of the number of data units processed by each said computer device in the event that the predetermined criteria are not satisfied, wherein said rerouting is responsive, at least in part, to said monitoring of said connection establishment and termination between said source computers and each of said plurality of computer devices.