Patent ID: 7103039

Claim:
A method comprising: a memory circuit receiving a data frame to be subsequently transmitted to a destination device via a first or second switching fabric, wherein the data frame comprises header and data fields, and wherein the first switching fabric comprises data ports through which data frames enter or exit the first switching fabric, wherein the second switching fabric comprises data ports through which data frames enter or exit the second switching fabric; selecting a first multi-bit value from a plurality of first multi-bit values according to the data contained in the one of the header fields, wherein the selected first multi-bit value comprises concatenated first and second multi-bit portions, wherein the bits of the first multi-bit portion correspond, respectively, to the data ports of the first and second switching fabrics, and wherein the bits of the second multi-bit portion correspond, respectively, to the data ports of the first and second switching fabrics; selecting a second multi-bit value from a plurality of second multi-bit values according to the data contained in the one of the header fields, wherein the bits of the first multi-bit value correspond, respectively, to the data ports of the first and second switching fabrics; concatenating the second multi-bit value with itself to produce a concatenated second multi-bit value; bit wise logically ANDing the selected first multi-bit value with the concatenated second multi-bit value to produce a third multi-bit value, wherein the third multi-bit comprises concatenated first and second portions; selecting one of the first and second portions of the third multi-bit value; adding the selected one of the first and second portions of the third multi-bit value to another header field of the received data frame; transmitting the received data frame from the memory circuit to one of the first and second switching fabrics; the data frame exiting the one of the first and second switching fabrics through one or more data ports thereof in accordance with the values of the bits of the selected one of the first and second portions of the third multi-bit value.