A method and apparatus for supporting unknown addresses in an emulated local area network using an asynchronous transfer mode interface

摘要

An interface is disclosed for transmitting data packets between clients in an emulated local area network (ELAN). When the destination address of the packet is unknown, address resolution is requested. A content addressable memory is used to allocate a virtual channel over which the packet is broadcast to all clients. This channel is known as a broadcast unknown server (BUS) channel. The unknown address is written into the memory and the age field therein is used to indicate that address resolution has been requested.