Patent ID: 7284074

Claim:
A network device, comprising: an input port adapted to be coupled to a computer network and structured to receive packets of data; a first FIFO queue coupled to the input port and structured to store the received packets of data; a first ingress process coupled to the first FIFO queue, the first ingress process configured to monitor an empty flag on the first FIFO queue and initiate reading data from the first FIFO queue when the empty flag signals there is data in the first FIFO queue; a second FIFO queue coupled to the first ingress process and structured to store data from the first ingress process; a second ingress process coupled to the second FIFO queue, the second ingress process configured to monitor an empty flag on the second FIFO queue and initiate reading data from the second FIFO queue when the empty flag signals there is data in the second FIFO queue; a switch fabric coupled to the second ingress process; a third FIFO queue coupled to the switch fabric and structured to accept a stream of data from the switch fabric grouped in data packets; a first egress process coupled to the third FIFO queue and structured to monitor an empty flag on the third FIFO queue and initiate reading data from the third FIFO queue when the empty flag of the third FIFO queue indicates that there is data in the third FIFO queue; a fourth FIFO queue coupled to the first egress process and structured to store data output by the first egress process; and a second egress process coupled to the fourth FIFO queue and configured to monitor an empty flag on the fourth FIFO queue and initiate reading data from the fourth FIFO queue when the empty flag of the fourth FIFO queue indicates that there is data in the fourth FIFO queue.