Patent Document ID: 7831606
Application ID: 11952103

Base Claim:
1. An integrated circuit chip comprising programmable intelligent search memory for content search wherein said programmable intelligent search memory performs regular expression based search and signature pattern based search, said programmable intelligent search memory using a plurality of regular expressions and a plurality of signature patterns, and said programmable intelligent search memory comprising a plurality of programmable FSA rule search engines to perform search using a plurality of regular expressions and further comprising one or more programmable signature search engines to perform content search using a plurality of signature patterns, said plurality of regular expressions comprising a plurality of symbols or characters, said plurality of regular expressions converted into a plurality of finite state automata representing the functionality of the said plurality of regular expressions for programming in the said programmable FSA rule search engines, said plurality of finite state automata comprising a plurality of states, said plurality of states derived from the said plurality of symbols or characters of said plurality of regular expressions, said content comprising a plurality of input symbols or characters provided as input to the said programmable intelligent search memory, said plurality of programmable FSA rule search engines comprising at least one of each of: a. a symbol memory circuit to store said plurality of symbols; b. a symbol evaluation circuit coupled to the said symbol memory circuit to evaluate match of the said plurality of symbols stored in the said symbol memory circuit with said plurality of input symbols of said content; c. a state dependent vector (SDV) memory circuit to store state transition controls for said plurality of finite state automata; d. a current state vector (CSV) memory circuit to store said plurality of states; and e. a state transition circuit coupled to the said symbol evaluation circuit, current state vector memory circuit and said state dependent vector memory circuit to perform state transition from one or more first states to one or more second states of said plurality of states of said plurality of finite state automata.

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Claim 2:
2. The integrated circuit chip of claim 1 , wherein the programmable signature search engines perform content search using said plurality of signature patterns, said plurality of signature patterns comprising a plurality of strings of characters of variable lengths, said plurality of signature patterns compiled into a compressed signature database by performing a plurality of hash operations using a plurality of hash functions, said plurality of hash functions to create a plurality of hash indices from said plurality of signature patterns, said compressed signature database having a memory bit set for each hash index generated from said plurality of signature patterns, said plurality of signature patterns further compiled to a plurality of FSAs into an exact signature match database used for performing exact signature match operations, said programmable signature search engines comprising at least one of each of: a. a signature search controller to control said programmable signature search engines; b. a content buffer to store a plurality of characters of said content; c. a plurality of hash engines coupled to said content buffer to perform said plurality of hash operations on said plurality of characters of said content; d. a signature hash memory coupled to said plurality of hash engines to store said compressed signature database; e. a coarse match logic to perform a coarse match on a set of characters of said content using said compressed signature database coupled to said plurality of hash engines and said signature hash memory; f. an exact match controller to perform exact signature match on said content that has a coarse match on said plurality of characters with said compressed signature database, said exact match controller to confirm a match in said content with at least one of said plurality of signature patterns; or g. a combination of any of a through f above.