Patent ID: 7454554
Filing Date: 2008-11-18
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. In a switching device comprising a plurality of input/output ports, a routing device, comprising: an array of registers wherein each register comprises content associating an address with one of said input/output ports in said switching device; an address sorting device coupled to the array of registers for pre-sorting the content of the array of registers into either a descending or ascending order; and an address matching element coupled to each register in said array of registers and coupled to the address sorting device wherein said address matching element is enabled to direct a communication packet to one of said ports associated with an address register of interest in said switch by comparing a target address in said communication packet to the content of said array of registers to identify the address register of interest associated with one of said ports, wherein said address matching element includes logic to sequentially compare the target address to the content of the array of registers beginning at the logically topmost address register in the array of registers and continuing in descending order through the array of registers, and: