| 摘要 |
The invention provides a multi-path network for use in a bridge, switch, router, hub or the like, e.g. an Ethernet bridge or router, comprising a plurality of network ports A-Z adapted for connection with one or more devices, each device having a different identifying address, e.g. MAC address; a plurality of network elements 18; and a plurality of network links 17 interconnecting the network elements and connecting the network elements to the network ports, wherein the multi-path network further comprises separately addressable memory elements each adapted for storing device address data and the multi-path network is adapted to distribute a plurality of device address data amongst the plurality of memory elements. The memory elements may be organised hierarchically. The distributed address table comprising several separately addressable sub-tables storing only a sub-group of the total number of active addresses is inherently scalable as there is no single point of entry into a central address store. |
