Patent ID: 7864764

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, with an intermediate network device, a packet from a client device of a first network that requests content from a remote network device of a second network, wherein the intermediate network device is positioned between the client device and the remote network device; identifying, with a classifier module of the intermediate network device, an application protocol with which the packet conforms; determining, based on the identified application protocol, a portion of a payload of the packet that is necessary to inspect in order to determine whether the packet represents a request for content currently cached by the intermediate network device; inspecting, with a classifier module of the intermediate network device, only the determined portion of the payload of the packet prior to queuing the packet for subsequent full processing by the intermediate network device without inspecting a remaining portion of the payload; issuing, with the classifier module, a request to begin retrieving and loading the requested content from a mass storage device within the intermediate network device to a memory within the intermediate network device based on the determination; queuing, with the classifier module, the packet within a queue of the intermediate network device; and after queuing the packet, processing the packet with a packet processing module of the intermediate network device to assemble a response that includes the content from the memory.