Nortel Networks Corporation

Martin Sproat

David John Stacey

Simon Daniel Brueckheimer

Michael Thomas

Julian Frank Barry Cable

Fai Tsang

Stephen Rylant Evans

Bruce Leigh Townsend

Andrew Geoffrey Tomlins

Stephen Leonard Fagg

Simon Daniel Breuckheimer

John Andrew Shotton

William Smith

Graham Fellows

John Shotton

An improved architecture in a circuit switched communications network is provided in which a plurality of network service provider devices, eg intelligent peripherals are arranged to provide network service data to a plurality of time division multiplex circuits and trunks by converting these circuits and trunks to streams of packets, and providing network service data packetized in a set of network service data packet streams to the circuit packet streams without incurring delays to the circuit packet streams. The circuit packet streams may be duplicated and forwarded to the network service provider devices without incurring delay to the ongoing through put packetized circuits, and similarly packet streams containing network service data may be superimposed into the circuit packet streams, without the requirement for the circuit packet streams to be switched to the network service provider devices. The architecture comprises a plurality of TDM interfaces, a plurality of conversion means for converting from time division multiplexed mode to a plurality of packet streams; a plurality of packet streams switching devices and a plurality of network service provider devices.

Network service provider architecture in communications network

A method and apparatus for handling persistence measurement of channel associated signaling for a plurality of line circuits, eg, T1, E1, OC3, STM 1 circuits, which extracts channel associated signaling data from a plurality of line circuits; assembles the channel associated signaling data into a data frame; contains the data frame in a suitable carrier, eg, an AAL 0 cell; monitors a continuous stream of the data frames, to check for changes in line status; and generates an event message data frame when a persistent change of line state has been detected. The extracting of associated signaling data may be provided on a separate card to a call control processor, and using separate processor functionality. A data processing load of a prior art call control processor which would otherwise be taken up in channel associated signaling persistence measurements may be alleviated, and the data processing burden on a prior art call control processor for handling persistence measurements is separated off and handled by the data processing apparatus and method according to the present disclosure.

Automated line signal processing

An interface arrangement provides interworking between packet (IP), time division multiplex (TDM) and asynchronous (ATM) networks, and incorporates a TDM framer providing an interface to the TDM network, a packet framer providing an interface to the packet network, and ATM adaptation function providing an interface to the ATM network. The ATM adaptation function comprises a set or suite of integrated circuit devices, the devices being partitioned by AAL functions into a first device set arranged to perform a common part sublayer function and a second device set arranged to perform service specific sublayer functions. The composition and nature of the device sets can be chosen to match the traffic types and quality of service requirements.

Asynchronous transfer mode adaptation arrangements

In order to support both signalling processing on a per channel basis and multiple adaptation protocols, an interface (,) is modularised principally by function. Incident channels (,, Ch,&mdash;Ch,) are applied to a routing device (,) that consults a connection map (,) to determine an appropriate path, via an interface (,), for signal processing of each channel, as shown in FIG.,. Modularised processing platforms (,) each contain a number of signal processors (,), with each processing platform providing an additional level of indirection with respect to channel handling. In this latter respect, one of the signal processors (,) on each platform is assigned to distribute channel processing to appropriately configured other ones of the signal processors and such that signal processing functions may be distributed between the other ones (,) of the signal processors. The present invention is particularly useful in relation to a narrowband-broadband interface to support differing adaptation protocols that require different signal processing functions and also to vary signal processing capabilities on a per call basis.

Adaption resource module and operating method therefor

Growing community of inventors

Stevenage, United Kingdom

Martin Sproat