CONTENT AWARE NETWORK APPARATUS

摘要

This invention relates to the field of broadband data networking equipment. More particularly, this invention relates to a network device that classifies and modifies traffic based on protocol, destination, source, and payload content. With reference to Fig.2, the network device (100) includes physical interfaces (102, 120) for converting analog network signals into bit streams and vice versa. The bit stream from a physical interface (102) is sent to a traffic flow scanning processor (40) that may be divided into a header processor (104), which scans the headers to obtain routing information and session identification, and a payload analyzer (110), which scans the payloads to further classify the corresponding data packets. The result of the scanning are used by the quality of service processor (116) for traffic management and traffic shaping.