Patent ID: 7139753

Claim:
A computer system comprising an apparatus fabricated on a semiconductor substrate, the apparatus comprising: an embedded processor complex including a plurality of protocol processors and an internal control point processor that provides frame processing; a plurality of hardware accelerator co-processors coupled to the embedded processor complex, wherein the plurality of hardware accelerator co-processors are accessible to each protocol processor and provide high speed pattern searching, data manipulation, and frame parsing; a plurality of memory devices coupled to the embedded processor complex, wherein the plurality of memory devices store a plurality of data structures that represent at least one search tree, wherein the data structures include a table comprising a plurality of entries, wherein at least one entry stores a leaf, and wherein the at least one leaf comprises a pattern corresponding to a search key containing an address; and a control memory arbiter coupled to the plurality of protocol processor, wherein the control memory arbiter controls the access of each protocol processor to the plurality of memory devices, wherein the table stored in the plurality of memory devices is utilized to match the pattern with the search key.