With the rapid development and the wide use of Bridged Local Area Networks, the importance of below-OSI-Layer-3 topology comes to be realized. Recent research work has demonstrated that active layer-2 topology can be determined using Address Forwarding Information. The large quantities of address forwarding entries in a typical BLAN, however, make their algorithms both time-consuming and bandwidth-consuming. In view of the above and the fact that transparent bridges are used preponderantly in real networks, we base our algorithm on information supported by Spanning Tree Protocol M1B group, which reduces the cost of acquiring and processing information, and improves the accuracy. Our algorithm relies on standard MIB information and can be used in heterogeneous environments
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