Patent ID: 7472158

Claim:
A computer system comprising: a processor; main memory; a bridge circuit connected to said processor and said main memory; and an initiator device coupled to said bridge circuit for interacting with a target device over a network, the initiator device providing a frame requesting a connection to a target device and receiving a frame requesting a connection from the target device, each device having a long address, said initiator device including: logic for providing an initiator connection tag which is appreciably shorter than a device address to the initiator frame requesting a connection; logic for providing a destination device address of the target device to the initiator frame requesting a connection; logic for providing a source device address of the initiator device to the initiator frame requesting a connection; a lookup table containing context information relating to the target device; logic for retrieving an initiator connection tag from a received frame requesting a connection from a target device; and logic for using said retrieved initiator connection tag to address said lookup table to obtain context information relating to the target device.