Patent ID: 7672318

Claim:
A dynamically adaptable network bridge, wherein the network bridge is one of a plurality of adaptable bridges in a network, said network bridge comprising the following internal components: a Rule Engine that processes data frames according to a set of switching rules, wherein each switching rule in the set comprises: a fitter function for determining whether a given switching rule is applicable to a given frame; an action function for determining how the given frame should be switched if the filter function determines that the given switching rule is applicable to the given frame; and a state vector accessible by the filter function and the action function, said state vector defining a plurality of sets of switching rules. bridge-specific data applicable to and accessible by all switching rules, a set of bridge resources for handling data frames, and context information regarding the traffic load in the bridge and other bridges in the network; means for dynamically modifying the switching rules, wherein when the state vector changes, the filter function applies different switching rules to the data frames and the action function switches the frames differently; and means for implementing a self-managed network by generating specific context rules as the traffic load on the bridge chances and distributing the context rules to other adaptable bridges in the network.