Patent ID: 7739406

Claim:
A computer-implemented method of reclaiming a portion of a network address space defined in a definitional listing stored on a computer, the method comprising: receiving at the computer a reclaim request comprising a specification of a block of network addresses and an action; executing an operation on the computer to mark all free blocks of addresses in the network address space affected by the reclaim request with a reclaim pending status in the definitional listing; executing an operation on the computer to determine whether an entirety of the block of network addresses is marked with the reclaim pending status in the definitional listing; upon determining that the entirety of the block of network addresses is marked with the reclaim pending status, executing an operation on the computer to perform the action in regard to the block of network addresses; upon determining that the entirety of the block of network addresses is not marked with the reclaim pending status, executing an operation on the computer to monitor a status of the network address space within the definitional listing to detect new free blocks of addresses affected by the reclaim request; upon detecting a new free block of addresses affected by the reclaim request, executing an operation on the computer to mark the new free block of addresses with the reclaim pending status in the definitional listing; and repeating the execution of the determining, monitoring, and marking operations on the computer until the entirety of the block of network addresses is marked with the reclaim pending status, wherein marking a block of addresses with the reclaim pending status in the definitional listing prevents allocation, movement, coalescing, or removal of the block of addresses within the definitional listing.