International Business Machines Corporation

Matthew T Belanger

Gary Roy Shippy

John T Lloyd

Brahmanand Kumar Gorti

Link-level data communications implemented in switching apparatus comprising modular switches disposed within a modular computer cabinet that includes modular computer systems; the switching apparatus configured as two layers of switches, the first layer switches coupled to one another for communications by inter-switch links, each second layer switch coupled for communications to the modular computer systems; all the switches stacked by a stacking protocol that shares administrative configuration information among the switches through the inter-switch links and presents all the switches as a single logical switch; the switching apparatus including ports coupling the apparatus to networks and to service applications and terminating applications on the modular computer systems; and sending the packet from network to modular computer system to which the packet is directed, or from modular computer system to network to which the packet is directed, the packet traversing none of the inter-switch links among the first layer switches.

Two-layer switch apparatus avoiding first layer inter-switch traffic in steering packets through the apparatus

Link-level data communications carried out in a link-level data communications switching apparatus that includes modular link-level data communications switches; the switching apparatus is configured as two layers of link-level data communications switches; all the switches stacked by a stacking protocol that shares administrative configuration information among the switches and presents the switches as a single logical switch; the switching apparatus includes data communications ports coupling the switching apparatus to data communications networks and to service applications, each service application associated with a unique, link-level identifier; the switching apparatus includes rules governing the steering of packets among service applications and networks; including receiving, in the switching apparatus, packets directed to a destination network; and steering each packet among the service applications to the destination network in accordance with the rules, without using the link-level identifier of any service application.

Two-layer switch apparatus to avoid first layer inter-switch link data traffic in steering packets through bump-in-the-wire service applications

Steering data communications packets among multiple service applications in a link-level data communications switching apparatus that includes a link-level data communications switch and data communications ports coupling the switching apparatus to networks organized into pairs of networks, and ports connected to service applications, the switching apparatus further including rules governing the steering of data communications among service applications and networks, at least one rule that includes a network code that identifies a network pair and a direction of travel between the networks, including receiving data communications packets directed to a destination network, each packet containing a source network address, and steering by the switching apparatus each packet, the steering carried out only in accordance with the rules, using neither the source network address of the packet, the destination network address of the packet, nor the link-level identifier of any service application.

Source-based steering data communications packets for transparent, bump-in-the-wire processing among multiple service applications

Steering data communications packets for transparent, bump-in-the-wire processing among multiple data processing applications in a link-level data communications switch, the switch including data communications ports, a port connected to a first data communications network and another port connected to a second data communications network, other ports connected to the data processing applications, the switch also including rules governing the steering, including receiving in the switch from the first network data communications packets directed to the second network, each packet containing a source network address and a destination network address and steering by the switch each packet among the applications and through an egress port, such steering carried out only in accordance with the rules, using neither the source network address of the packet, the destination network address of the packet, nor any link-level identifier of any application.

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Holly Springs, NC, United States of America

Matthew T Belanger