1. An architecture for finding rule matches within an input stream, comprising: a symbol buffer; a dispatcher operably connected to said symbol buffer and operably enabled to dispatch DFA descent starting positions; an instruction memory which holds instructions for transitions from DFA states; and at least one executer which receives DFA descent starting positions from the dispatcher, retrieves instructions from the instruction memory and symbols from the symbol buffer, executes said instructions and performs parallel DFA descents starting in root states at varying positions in an input stream, and outputs a plurality of tokens from a plurality of the parallel DFA descents.