Patent ID: 7593400

Claim:
A method for communication, comprising: configuring a network node having a plurality of ports, and at least first and second line cards with respective first and second ports, to operate as a distributed media access control (MAC) bridge in a Layer 2 data network; configuring a link aggregation (LAG) group of parallel physical links between two endpoints in said Layer 2 data network joined together into a single logical link, said LAG group having a plurality of LAG ports and a plurality of conjoined member line cards; providing for each of said member line cards a respective forwarding database (FDB) to hold records associating MAC addresses with ports of said plurality of ports of said network node; receiving a data packet on an ingress port of said network node from a MAC source address, said data packet specifying a MAC destination address on said Layer 2 data network; conveying, by transmitting said data packet to said MAC destination address via said first port, said received data packet in said network node to at least said first line card for transmission to said MAC destination address; if said MAC destination address does not appear in said FDB, flooding said data packet via one and only one LAG port of said plurality of LAG ports; checking said MAC source address of the data packet against records in said FDB of said first line card; and if said FDB of said first line card does not contain a record of an association of said MAC source address with said ingress port, creating a new record of said association, adding said new record to the FDB of said first line card, and sending a message of the association to each member line card of said plurality of member line cards.