US 6,983,332 B1
Port-bundle host-key mechanism
Shuxian Lou, San Jose, Calif. (US); Richard M. Pruss, Los Gatos, Calif. (US); Ian M. Cotton, Reading (United Kingdom); Mark C. Willis, Burghfield (United Kingdom); and Adam L. Taylor, Acton, Mass. (US)
Assigned to Cisco Technology, Inc., San Jose, Calif. (US)
Filed on Apr. 23, 2001, as Appl. No. 9/841,587.
Int. Cl. G06F 15/16 (2006.01); G06F 3/00 (2006.01)
U.S. Cl. 709—246 25 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
10. An apparatus for associating a specific subscriber with one of a plurality of port bundles, comprising:
at least one source port to receive at least one data packet, the data packet having a subscriber address;
each of the one of the plurality of port bundles coupled to the source port;
a plurality of memories, each of the plurality of memories coupled to one of the plurality of port bundles;
a port bundle logical object coupled to each of the plurality of memories to associate the specific subscriber with the one of the plurality of port bundles, wherein the port bundle logical object is coupled to the one of the plurality of port bundles such that a mapping between the specific subscriber and the one of the plurality of port bundles is created and saved in the port bundle logical object;
a processor coupled to the plurality of port bundles, wherein said processor is configured to reserve the one of the plurality of port bundles for the specific subscriber if the specific subscriber has not been assigned one of the plurality of port bundles, the plurality of port bundles associated with an an aggregation device, said processor further configured to assign the one of the plurality of port bundles to the specific subscriber if the specific subscriber is authenticated; and
an output port coupled to the processor.