IMPROVED METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DYNAMICALLY SHIFTING BETWEEN ROUTING AND SWITCHING PACKETS IN A TRANSMISSION NETWORK

A method and apparatus for dynamically shifting between switching and routing packets efficiently to provide high throughput. The present invention provides a method for transmitting packets betwee an upstream node and a downstream node in a network that utilizes flow classification and labelling to redirect flows. The method includes the steps of establishing default virtual channels between the upstream node and the downstream node (1602), receiving packets at the downstream node, performing flow classification at the downstream node on the packet to determine whether the packet belongs to a specified flow that should be redirected in the upstream node (170), selecting a free label at the downstream node (1668) and informing the upstream node that future packets belonging to the specified flow should be sent with the selected free label attached (1676). Other embodiments of the invention include a basic switching unit (1, 3), a switch gateway unit (21), and a switching agent for use in a system for transmitting packets in a network.