Patent ID: 8266339

Claim:
A network interface controller, comprising: at least one interface to a physical layer device (PHY); at least one network media access controller (MAC) communicatively coupled to the at least one interface to the PHY; at least one direct memory access (DMA) controller to transfer data, the data including packets received via the at least one interface to the PHY and the at least one MAC; storage to hold configuration settings, wherein the configuration settings comprise: a timer value specifying a recurring timer interval to transfer operation statistics of the network interface controller by DMA to memory; a location in the memory to transfer the operation statistics to; at least one indication of a one-shot, non-recurring, transfer of the operation statistics; at least one indication of a selection of the operation statistics; and circuitry to, when in operation: in response to the configuration settings being configured for a one-shot request, perform a non-recurring, one time DMA transfer of the operation statistics to the memory via an interface; and in response to the configuration settings being configured for the recurring timer interval, repeatedly causing transfer of the operation statistics of the network interface controller by DMA to the memory based on periodicity specified by the timer value.