NFA BYTE DETECTOR

摘要

An automaton hardware engine employs a transition table organized into 2n rows, where each row comprises a plurality of n-bit storage locations, and where each storage location can store at most one n-bit entry value. Each row corresponds to an automaton state. In one example, at least two NFAs are encoded into the table. The first NFA is indexed into the rows of the transition table in a first way, and the second NFA is indexed in to the rows of the transition table in a second way. Due to this indexing, all rows are usable to store entry values that point to other rows.

主权项

1. An automaton engine, comprising:
a transition table organized into 2n rows, wherein each row comprises a plurality of storage locations, wherein each storage location has n bits and no more than n bits, wherein each storage location stores an n-bit entry value, wherein a first automaton and a second automaton are both encoded in the transition table, and wherein each row is usable to store an entry value that points to at least one other row; and next state logic that receives entry values from the transition table and generates therefrom a next state vector.