American Telephone and Telegraph, Co.

At&t Information Systems Inc.

Larry D Bowyer

Richard A Windhausen

David L Bauer

David M Ruby

There is disclosed a port communication method and apparatus for controlling system controller communications with port circuits of the system. The port communication apparatus generates commands to port module interfaces, interposed between the controller and port circuits, in a predetermined order and receives acknowledgement signals therefrom. Thereafter, the port interfaces concurrently collect data from the associated port circuits and transmit this data in response to a subsequent read command from the port communication apparatus. In one embodiment the port communication apparatus includes a programmable microcode routine which generates the commands using input parameters which are specified in various registers and in the microcode program call.

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Boulder, CO, United States of America

Larry D Bowyer