Patent ID: 7822056

Claim:
A method, performed at a compressor node including a first line card initially designated active and a second line card initially designated inactive, the method for updating a context identifier storage of a decompressor node in a communications network, the method comprising: maintaining, at each line card, a line card activity number; receiving a first packet belonging to a flow; storing, at each line card, a flow record in a line card context identifier storage, wherein the flow record contains flow identifying information, a flow context identifier, and a flow activity number, the flow activity number being initially set equal to a current value of the line card activity number; detecting, by the second line card, a change in designation to active and subsequently changing the value of the line card activity number maintained by the second line card to an updated line card activity number; receiving a second packet belonging to the flow; determining, by the second line card, the flow activity number and the flow context identifier associated, in the line card context identifier storage, with the flow; and transmitting, to the decompressor node, an update packet including the flow context identifier and the flow identifying information upon determining that the flow activity number is not equal to the updated line card activity number.