International Business Machines Corporation

James Harold Ragsdale

Jeffrey James Lynch

Vicki Gentry Horton

George Allen Deaton, Jr

Arthur James Stagg

Ralph J Potok, Ii

Yves J Huchet

Claude Richard Pond

Charles Pierre Rheinart

R John Potok

Robert M Teague

David James Franse

Charles E Williford

C Eric Williford

An improvement in the Open Systems Interconnection model in which Service Access Points can be established directly between peer entities in the same layer of a protocol stack. This direct seamless peer-to-peer communication is vastly superior to the use of a higher level relay function to set up and manage the communication path. In particular, setup messages are exchanged between the peer entities and a higher layer to create the Service Access Point between the peer entities. The setup and management capabilities are contained in each of the peer entities and hence no relay function is required after the peer Service Access Point, substantially speeding up the communication and reducing the management overhead.

Seamless peer-to-peer communications in a layered communications

A method and arrangement for providing a layered communications environment for the routing of information blocks between layers to layer entities forming a logical group based on information block type and the function provided by the individual entities of the group. When an access point (AP) between layers, is first activated, it is given a group classification. As other APs between the layers are activated, they too are given group classifications. All APs between the layers having the same group classification are considered to form a single logical grouping of APs. Each of these APs can be attached to different entities in the adjacent upper layer. This logical grouping allows for information block routing from a lower layer to the adjacent upper layer based on both logical group and block type. The entities in the upper layer that are within one logical group may include separate entities for control and management functions and separate entities for data transport purposes.

Logical grouping of layer entities in a layered communication

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Raleigh, NC, United States of America

James Harold Ragsdale