| 摘要 |
The present invention provides an improved architecture and method for the processing and transmission of multicast packets within a switching device. Briefly, as multicast packets arrive, a copy of the packet, or preferably a pointer for it, is placed in a multicast FIFO. As each pointer reaches the head of the FIFO, the destination output ports via which the packet is to be transmitted are determined, based on the packet's multicast group identifier (MGID). In the preferred embodiment, there is a dedicated multicast output queue associated with each output port. Copies of the packet, or preferably pointers to the packet, are then stored in those output queues associated with the specified destination output ports. In this way, a congested output port only affects the transmission of multicast packets via that congested port.
|
