MULTI-HOST ETHERNET CONTROLLER

摘要

Described herein is a system having a multi-host Ethernet controller (102) configured to provide communication and control between two or more independent host processors (104) and a network device. In one implementation, the multi host Ethernet controller (102), having an integrated L2 switch (110) to enable a plurality of independent host systems to access same physical gigabit network port concurrently. Each host processor (104) sees the controller as PCI based independent network controller and accesses the controller using its own mini-port driver. The common programming parameters such as Link Speed or Inter Packet Gap (IPG) are programmed by a virtualization engine. Packets from network (LAN) are switched based on MAC destination address and sent to corresponding host based on MAC destination address. Packets from each host processor (104) are forwarded to network interface or other host processor (104) based on MAC destination address.

主权项

1. A multi-host Gigabit Ethernet Controller (102) for sharing of a physical network (112) among a plurality of host processors (104) in a multi-host computing system, wherein the multi-host Gigabit Ethernet Controller (102) is communicatively coupled to each of the plurality of host processors (104) through a PCIe based link, the multi-host Gigabit Ethernet Controller (102) comprising:
a medium access control (MAC) layer (108) common among the plurality of host processors (104) configured to receive data packets for the plurality of host processors (104) through the physical network (112), wherein the MAC layer (108) is implemented in a data link layer structure; a Layer-2 (L2) switch (110) comprising at least one port for each of the plurality of host processors (104) and the MAC layer (108) to exchange data packets between the plurality of host processors (104) and the MAC layer (108), wherein the L2 switch (110) is configured to parse the received data packets from the MAC layer (108) to determine a MAC destination address; and a plurality of host modules (118), each coupled to the L2 switch (110) and a host processor (104) from amongst the plurality of host processors (104) configured to concurrently process the data packets for the host processors (104) received from the L2 switch (110) enabling sharing of the physical network (112) among the plurality of host processors (104).