Northern Telecom Limited

Jeffrey J Brown

Alan Frank Graves

Charles Kevin Huscroft

Sandro Cianci

Bernard Courville

Norman Zolyniak

Kent G Bodell

In methods and apparatus for providing suppressed ringing access to a subscriber line, a connection request is sent from a server to a telecommunications switch and the switch performs a connection routine in response to the connection request to connect the server to the subscriber line. The connection routine is adapted to avoid audible ringing of a telephone set connected to the subscriber line. The connection request comprises a signal indicating a subscriber line to which the server is to be connected and a signal indicating that suppressed ringing access to that subscriber line is desired. The methods and apparatus avoid the need for especially provisioned trunks between the server and the terminating switches by including in the connection request a signal indicating that suppressed ringing is desired and by making the telecommunications switch responsive to that signal.

Methods and apparatus for providing suppressed ringing access

Data to be switched is preceded by a header containing routing information for establishing a connection via a switch, and is accompanied by additional information which indicates the start of the header, in response to which a connection is established, and the end of the data, in response to which the connection is terminated. The switch is a non-saturating, non-blocking, full matrix time switch which uses the routing information to establish a connection within one tdm frame, whereby connections for data of any type (including switch control information) and of arbitrary duration can be handled efficiently. An incoming channel can be connected to any free channel or to a specified outgoing channel of any output port, and contention resolution is provided for simultaneous requests for connection to a single outgoing channel. Interconnections among crosspoint nodes are reduced and simplified using token ring and systolic interconnection techniques.

Method of and switch for switching information

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Edmonton, Canada

Jeffrey J Brown