Idea Of Packet Processing
As we are describing in the top model view of Idea of smart packet architecture of packet processing. The general flow of packets through an active node is shown in Figure 2. When a packet is received on a physical link, it is first classified based on information in the packet ; this classification deter mines the input channel including protocol processing-- to which the packet is directed. Classification of incoming packets is controlled by patterns specified by the EEs. In the typical case, an EE requests creation of a channel for packets with certain attributes, such as a given Ethernet type or combination of IP protocol and TCP port numbers; this request may be issued for the EE itself, or on behalf of an active application. After input channel processing the packet is handed off to the EE that requested creation of the channel; note that this may involve the packet waiting in a queue.
EE 2 also receives UDP datagrams containing ANEP packets (presumably with a different port number and/or ANEP packet type), as well as plain UDP datagrams, ANEP packets in IP datagrams, and IP datagrams matching some pattern. It is the responsibility of the NodeOS and security engine to ensure that the requesting principal is permitted access to the set of packets implied by the pattern associated with a channel creation request. Incoming packets that match no pattern are dropped. On the output side, EEs transmit packets by submitting them to output channels, which include protocol processing as well as output scheduling. Thus, the general progression is link input, classification, input protocol processing, EE/AA processing, output protocol processing, scheduling, and link transmission. Note that in general it need not be the case that each transmitted packet corresponds to some received packet; EEs may aggregate packets for periodic forwarding, or even generate them spontaneously. The NodeOS also provides more sophisticated levels of access to both the computation and the transmission resources of the node. These scheduling mechanisms isolate different classes of traffic from the effects of other traffic.[4]