Patent ID: 7769892

Claim:
A method, in a data processing system, for selecting, from a plurality of routes through the data processing system, an indirect route for transmitting data, the method comprising: receiving data at a first processor within a set of processors that is to be transmitted to a destination processor, wherein the data includes address information; identifying, in one or more routing table data structures, indirect route entries corresponding to a plurality of indirect routes for transmitting data from a first processor to a destination processor; accessing a priority table data structure associated with the one or more routing table data structures, wherein the priority table data structure comprises a priority entry for each entry in the one or more routing table data structures, the priority entry specifying a priority of a corresponding entry in the one or more routing table data structures; selecting an indirect route entry corresponding to an indirect route in the plurality of indirect routes from the one or more routing table data structures, based on specified priorities in priority entries of the priority table data structure corresponding to the indirect route entries of the plurality of indirect routes; and transmitting the data from the first processor to the destination processor using a path corresponding to the selected indirect route entry, wherein the entries in the one or more routing table data structures comprise a pointer field that stores a pointer to a priority entry in the priority table data structure corresponding to the entry in the one or more routing table data structures, and wherein accessing the priority table data structure comprises using a pointer in a first indirect route entry to identify a corresponding priority entry in the priority table data structure.