SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ROUTING A CROSS SEGMENTS OF A NETWORK SWITCH

摘要

A method and a system for using a network switch (120) as in a gateway, to route frames between network segments associated with separate subnets (102, 104, 106) is disclosed. Frames from one network segment of a source subnet can be provided to one of a plurality of ports (132, 134, 136, 138) of a network switch (120). The network switch (120) provides the frames to a processor (140) with a source port indicator, whereupon the processor (140) performs any higher-level processing of the frames, such as routing, Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) or network address translation (NAT). After any applicable modification of the frame the processor (140) provides the modified frame with a destination port indicator back to the network switch (120) for output on one or more ports (132, 134, 136, 138) connected to one or more network segments (102, 104, 106) associated with the destination subnet.