Lsi Corporation

Agere Systems Inc.

Lin Hua

Cheng Gang Duan

Michael Samuel Shaffer

Tao Wang

Qian Xu

Ze Mian Huang

Si Ruo Chen

Jian-Guo Chen

Nevin C Heintze

Kent E Wires

Hakan I Pekcan

Chenggang Duan

Methods and apparatus are provided for framing synchronization control for a framer/mapper/multiplexor (FMM) device with 1+1 and equipment protection. FMM device are disclosed that synchronize one or more internal signals by changing a phase of the one or more internal signals without changing a frequency of the one or more internal signals based on a desired phase at a destination of each of the one or more internal signals. A programmable synchronization signal may optionally be employed for the synchronization.

Methods and apparatus for system framing synchronization control for a framer/mapper/multiplexor device with 1+1 and equipment protection

A communication device comprises a signal combiner, first storage elements, second storage elements and a controller. The signal combiner is configured to combine overhead information with additional information in forming a frame of a signal. The first storage elements are adapted to receive respective portions of a given block of the overhead information to be applied to the signal combiner, and the second storage elements are coupled between respective ones of the first storage elements and respective inputs of the signal combiner. The controller is operative to monitor a count of portions of the frame as the frame is formed by the signal combiner and to control loading of the portions of the given block of the overhead information into the second storage elements from the first storage elements responsive to the monitored count. The disclosed techniques for guaranteed consistent overhead insertion can be implemented in any type of communication system which utilizes overhead insertion in its framing operations.

Method and apparatus for signal formation with guaranteed consistent overhead insertion

Techniques are disclosed for in-band communication of alarm status information or other information between physical layer devices comprising a working device and a protection device in a network-based communication system. In one aspect, a protection receive signal is monitored in the protection device for the presence of alarm status information. The protection device encodes alarm status information extracted from the protection receive signal, and inserts the encoded alarm status information into one or more designated portions of a protection loop-back signal supplied from the protection device to the working device. The protection loop-back signal is monitored in the working device and the encoded alarm status information therein is decoded and utilized by the working device to initiate a protection switching operation.

In-band communication of alarm status information in a synchronous transport communication system

An apparatus for monitoring of received information in a communication device comprises a first buffer having a plurality of storage elements adapted to store respective portions of the received information, a second buffer coupled to the first buffer and having a plurality of storage elements corresponding to respective ones of the storage elements of the first buffer, and controller circuitry coupled to the buffers and operative to detect a message sequence comprising a plurality of the portions of the received information. The second buffer stores a previously-detected message sequence loaded from the first buffer into the second buffer under control of the controller circuitry. The controller circuitry in detecting a current message sequence is configurable in at least first and second different monitoring modes each associated with a different message format. The monitoring mode of the controller circuitry may be adaptively configured based at least in part on a detected message sequence.

Received information monitor adaptive to multiple monitoring modes in a communication device

A buffer circuit for use in a node in a network-based data transport system is configurable for providing channel status information of all channels associated with a given signal in the network-based data transport system. The buffer circuit includes a memory and a controller coupled to the memory. The controller is operative: (i) to receive channel status information from a plurality of different channel status sources; (ii) to select one of the channel status sources for supplying the channel status information at a given point in time; and (iii) to store the channel status information corresponding to the selected channel status source in the memory.

Obtaining channel status in a network-based data transport architecture

In one embodiment, the present invention is a framer/mapper/multiplexor (FMM) device that can simultaneously (i) send protection copies of both its working incoming high-speed (e.g., STS-12) signal and incoming low-speed signals to a protection FMM device, and (ii) receive corresponding protection signals from the protection FMM device. Furthermore, the FMM device can select between working and protection signals at a switching level (e.g., STS-1) lower than the high-speed level, allowing for 1+1 APS/MSP protection and equipment protection at the board level, the device level, and at the STS-1 level. Yet further, four or more FMM devices can be configured so that all FMM devices can communicate with their corresponding protection FMM devices using a single, shared, 4-pin link (e.g., quad-OC-3 mode), and still select between working and protection signals at the switching level (e.g., STS-1).

Framer/mapper/multiplexor device with 1+1 and equipment protection

In a communication system comprising a mapper or other type of physical layer device coupled to a link layer device, the physical layer device comprises payload extraction circuitry and payload insertion circuitry. The payload extraction circuitry is configured to extract a payload from an ingress synchronous transport signal received over an ingress link, and the payload insertion circuitry is configured to insert a payload received from the link layer device into an egress synchronous transport signal for transmission over an egress link. The payload extracted from the ingress synchronous transport signal is transmitted by the physical layer device to the link layer device over an output serial data line of a serial interface, and the payload inserted into the egress synchronous transport signal is received by the physical layer device from the link layer device over an input serial data line of the serial interface.

Synchronous transport signal mapper with payload extraction and insertion functionality

An apparatus and method are provided for extracting connection information from a traffic header in a communications network. The apparatus includes a first storage element containing a first look-up table for determining a first data packet header offset and data size for extracting a communications protocol type from the header and a second storage element containing a second look-up table for determining from the communications protocol type a second data packet header offset and second data size for extracting a connection address from the header. The storage elements may be in the form of content-addressable memories. Exception handling and hardware initialization can be controlled by a system processor.

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Shanghai, China

Lin Hua