Method and apparatus for address to port mapping in a token ring network
First Claim
1. A method for address to port mapping in a ring network, the method comprising the steps of:
- performing neighbor notification where each station on the network sequentially transmits its own neighbor notification frame onto the ring indicating an address of a respective station, a receiving station modifying a received neighbor notification frame if said receiving station is a first station to receive said neighbor notification frame;
upstream monitoring of an upstream side of a port on the network to determine when an immediately upstream station transmits its neighbor notification frame onto the ring;
downstream monitoring of a downstream side of said port and recording all addresses in frames after said immediately upstream station transmits its neighbor notification frame onto the ring until said downstream monitoring determines an address of a station immediately upstream of said downstream side;
mapping all of said addresses recorded and determined from said downstream side to said port.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A token ring network performs address to port mapping by taking advantage of the abilities of the port switched modules and the neighbor notification process, in order to perform address to port mapping on each individual module. Ring monitors are switched from an upstream side of a port to a downstream side of a port when the neighbor notification process enters the port domain. The processor on the module records all the addresses received on the downstream side of the port, when the neighbor notification process is in the domain of that port. If it appears that the neighbor notification process is in the domain of two adjacent ports, the present invention only records addresses from the most downstream of the two adjacent ports, since such a situation is an indication that the upstream ports do not conform to MAC protocol. If a non-protocol station is connected to the last port in a module, the module will collect addresses from that port until the neighbor notification process enters the most upstream port of the module. At that point, addresses are no longer recorded in the most downstream port, and each set of addresses for each port are checked to determine if the last entry in each port has the ARI bits set to one and the source address is similar to the address of the most upstream neighbor of the module. If the addresses are the same, all addresses recorded in that port are ignored, since that port contains a non-protocol station.
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Citations
19 Claims
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1. A method for address to port mapping in a ring network, the method comprising the steps of:
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performing neighbor notification where each station on the network sequentially transmits its own neighbor notification frame onto the ring indicating an address of a respective station, a receiving station modifying a received neighbor notification frame if said receiving station is a first station to receive said neighbor notification frame; upstream monitoring of an upstream side of a port on the network to determine when an immediately upstream station transmits its neighbor notification frame onto the ring; downstream monitoring of a downstream side of said port and recording all addresses in frames after said immediately upstream station transmits its neighbor notification frame onto the ring until said downstream monitoring determines an address of a station immediately upstream of said downstream side; mapping all of said addresses recorded and determined from said downstream side to said port. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A ring network system for address to port mapping the system comprising:
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a plurality of ports formed into a ring; a plurality of stations connected to said plurality of ports; neighbor notification means positioned in each of said plurality of stations and for performing neighbor notification where said neighbor notification means sequentially transmits its own neighbor notification frame onto the ring indicating an address of a respective station, a receiving station modifying a received neighbor notification frame if said receiving station is a first station to receive said neighbor notification frame; a plurality of upstream monitoring means, each upstream monitoring means for monitoring of an upstream side of one of said plurality of ports on the network to determine when an immediately upstream station transmits its neighbor notification frame onto the ring; a plurality of downstream monitoring means, each downstream monitoring means for monitoring of a downstream side of one said plurality of ports, said downstream monitoring means recording all addresses in frames after said immediately upstream station transmits its neighbor notification frame onto the ring and until said downstream monitoring determines an address of a station immediately upstream of said downstream side; mapping means for mapping all of said addresses recorded and determined from said each downstream monitoring means to a respective port. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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Specification