Patent ID: 8638767

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, at a network communication device, a packet in a legacy packet format from a host device via a legacy network interface for transmission to a destination network device; determining whether the packet received at the network communication device via the legacy network interface is to be transmitted using a legacy communication protocol or a non-legacy communication protocol of a plurality of non-legacy communication protocols based, at least in part, on a portion of content in a payload of the packet; in response to determining the packet is to be transmitted using the non-legacy communication protocol based, at least in part, on the portion of the content in the payload of the packet, determining a processing path within the network communication device in accordance with which to process the packet for transmission using the non-legacy communication protocol; and reformatting the packet in the legacy packet format to yield a target packet in a non-legacy packet format based, at least in part, on the non-legacy communication protocol; and transmitting the target packet to the destination network device in accordance with the non-legacy communication protocol.