Patent ID: 8868672

Claim:
An aggregation device, comprising: a switch fabric in communication with a plurality of electronic devices; a control plane processor that fetches a first transmit descriptor from a memory at a first electronic device, including information corresponding to data ready for output from the memory at the first electronic device, the information including a location of the memory at the first electronic device where the data resides and the size of the data, wherein the control plane processor comprises a virtual network interface card (vNIC), and wherein the vNIC fetches the data from the first electronic device; and a rendezvous memory in communication with the switch fabric, wherein the control plane processor transfers the data to the rendezvous memory from the first electronic device of the plurality of electronic devices in response to a determination, using the first transmit descriptor, that the data is ready for output from the memory at the first electronic device and in response to an allocation of a location in the rendezvous memory sufficient to contain the data; and wherein a rendezvous management module fetches from the rendezvous memory a second transmit descriptor including information corresponding to the data ready for output from the rendezvous memory, the information including a location of the rendezvous memory where the data resides and the size of the data and moves the data, using the second transmit descriptor, from the rendezvous memory to the second electronic device in response to a determination that the data is ready for output from the rendezvous memory to the second electronic device and in response to a location allocated in a memory at the second electronic device for the data.