System and method for flow mirroring in a network switch
First Claim
1. A process for flow mirroring in an information network switch comprising:
- a) receiving information at an ingress port;
b) determining whether said information is a part of a particular flow of information that is a member of a preselected group of flows of information; and
c) copying said information and forwarding one of the copies to a mirror port if said information is determined to be part of said particular flow.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A network switch has a plurality of mirror ports to which data is copied for purposes such as networking monitoring. Data flows are identified and copied to an appropriate mirror port in response to the type of flow, a mirroring policy set up by a network administrator, and a distribution mechanism. A monitoring device attached to each mirror port is able to monitor specific types of traffic. Because the data flows are distributed among a plurality of mirror ports and monitoring devices, the ports and devices are less likely to overflow and therefore are more likely to be able handle the copied data without dropping data packets. The mirror ports are collected into groups of such ports. A given port may only be a member of a single group at one time. The mirroring policy must identify the group to which a particular type of flow is copied.
249 Citations
25 Claims
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1. A process for flow mirroring in an information network switch comprising:
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a) receiving information at an ingress port;
b) determining whether said information is a part of a particular flow of information that is a member of a preselected group of flows of information; and
c) copying said information and forwarding one of the copies to a mirror port if said information is determined to be part of said particular flow.
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2. A process for flow mirroring in a data packet network switch comprising:
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a) receiving a data packet at an ingress port;
b) determining whether said data packet is a part of a preselected particular flow of data packets;
a) copying said data packet and forwarding one of the copies to a mirror port if said data packet is determined to be part of said particular flow. - View Dependent Claims (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
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22. A network switch, comprising:
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at least one ingress port to receive data packets into the switch;
at least one egress port to transport data packets out of the switch;
a mirror port; and
a switch processor that routes said data packets on said at least one egress port, determines which of said received data packets are members of a group of at least one particular flow and to copy said member packets to said mirror port. - View Dependent Claims (23, 24, 25)
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Specification