Patent ID: 7948922

Claim:
In a network device of a plurality of network devices configured to implement a link management protocol for blocking ports corresponding to redundant links between individual network devices of the plurality of network devices, a method for preventing delivery of selected traffic to a port of the network device, the method comprising: executing, at the network device, a link management protocol process to identify, during a convergence phase of the link management protocol process, a port of the network device to be blocked in a steady state of the link management protocol process; causing the identified port of the network device to be in a blocked state during the steady state of the link management protocol process; determining, at the network device, that a remote port of a remote device is to be placed in a blocked state during the steady state of the link management protocol process based on the identified port of the network device to be blocked; and periodically transmitting, during the steady state of the link management protocol process, a port block notification message to the remote device, wherein the port block notification message is operative to cause the remote device to stop transmitting multicast, broadcast and flooding unicast traffic to the network device from the remote port to the identified port.