Patent ID: 8599845

Claim:
A network processing unit, comprising: a first table comprising a first entry for a network, the first entry comprising a network aging period associated with the network, the network comprising the network processing unit; a forwarding table associated with the network, the forwarding table comprising a second entry, the second entry associated with a first network entity and comprising an indication of whether network traffic associated with the first network entity has been encountered in a current network aging period or a previously expired network aging period; and a processor; wherein: the processor is configured to receive an indication from a hardware timer that a hardware aging period has ended; upon receiving the indication from the hardware timer, the processor is configured to determine, for one or more networks, whether the network aging period has ended; if the network aging period for a given network has ended, the processor is configured to determine, for one or more first network entities listed in the forwarding table associated with the given network, whether traffic associated with the first network entity has been encountered in a current network aging period or a previously expired network aging period; if traffic associated with the first network entity has not been encountered in either a current network aging period or a previously expired network aging period, then the processor is configured to remove the first network entity from the forwarding table.