MICROKERNEL ARCHITECTURE-BASED FORWARDER

摘要

A method of forwarding data packets in a network device having an operating system (202). The method includes forwarding a data packet at the device driver layer (235) in the network device without the operating system performing context switching in conjunction with forwarding the data packets. In another embodiment, a method of forwarding data packets in a network device having an operating system includes initiating a switching microdriver (280) to retrieve a data packet, and forwarding the data packet to or from the switching microdriver (280) without involving of the operating system.