| 摘要 |
Disclosed herein is a method and apparatus for supporting a virtual forwarding database in response to telecommunications network service demands and standard Media Access Control learning processes to support an overall forwarding database greater than the size supported in hardware. An example embodiment of the present invention provides a possible solution or workaround for certain hardware platforms that limit the total number of forwarding entries that are currently available. This is done by creating a virtual forwarding database that may be maintained in local random access memory and not in the switch(es)/network processors' forwarding database. As such, a traffic module (e.g., application code/processor or central processing unit) may continuously update a virtual forwarding database along with a dedicated forwarding database based on the reception of external data, which includes, but is not limited to, any combination of the following: IPTV joins/leaves, new/unknown packets, and known packets.
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