Patent ID: 8909726
Filing Date: 2014-12-09
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. An apparatus comprising: a network interface configured to acquire a data packet specifying an anycast address as a destination address; a forwarding database comprising a plurality of forwarding database entries, wherein each forwarding database entry is associated with a destination node and is configured to hold an anycast address of the destination node and a bit mask, the bit mask having a number of asserted bits, the number of asserted bits representing a priority associated with the destination node; and a forwarding engine configured to apply the destination address specified in the data packet to the forwarding database to locate a plurality of matching forwarding database entries, the forwarding engine to select a particular matching forwarding database entry from the plurality of matching forwarding database entries that has a greater number of asserted bits in its bit mask than any other entries of the plurality of matching forwarding database entries, and to forward the data packet towards the destination node associated with the particular matching forwarding database entry.