Method and apparatus for storing sparse and dense subtrees in a longest prefix match lookup table

摘要

We present a lookup table which allows sparse subtree descriptors and dense subtree descriptors to be stored in the same memory. A subtree entry in the memory stores a dense subtree descriptor for a dense subtree or a plurality of sparse subtree descriptors for sparse subtrees. The subtree entry is indexed by a leaf in the previous subtree. The sparse subtree descriptor stores at least one node descriptor. The node descriptor describes a set of leaves in the sparse subtree having a common value. The common value is encoded in the node descriptor using run length encoding.