Egenera, Inc.

Neil Haley

Justin Maynard

Michael Ferrari

Paul Michael Curtis

A system, method, and adapter for creating fault-tolerant communication busses from standard components, are described. Fault-tolerant interface logic is provided for transmitting and receiving system health and system management signals to and from a module that is designed to be connected to a single RS-485 bus. The fault-tolerant interface logic enables the module to selectively communicate via at least two redundant half-duplex, multipoint, differential RS-485 busses. The fault-tolerant interface logic includes a first RS-485 transceiver connected to a first RS-485 bus, a second RS-485 transceiver connected to a second RS-485 bus, selector logic responsive to a control signal for selecting one of the first and the second busses to receive signals from and for transmitting the received signals to the module, and software logic executable on a baseboard management controller (BMC) chip. The software logic includes control logic for monitoring the health of the selected bus and for providing the control signal to the selector logic.

System, method, and adapter for creating fault-tolerant communication busses from standard components

A method and system of emulating serial com port communication. A computer processing system has computer-executable operating system instructions including first instructions that interact with a first serial device according to a predefined input/output (I/O) hardware interface. A first serial device has a receive port and a transmit port and has the predefined (I/O) hardware interface. A second serial device has a receive port and a transmit port. The transmit port of the first serial device is in serial communication with the receive port of the second serial device, and the receive port of the first serial device is in serial communication with the transmit port of the second serial device. Computer-executable instructions emulate serial communication port device communication and include instructions that transmit information over another medium in response to receive requests from the second serial device.

System and method for emulating serial port communication

A method and system of emulating serial com port communication. A computer processing system has computer-executable operating system instructions including first instructions that interact with a first serial device according to a predefined input/output (I/O) hardware interface. A first serial device has a receive port and a transmit port and has the predefined (I/O) hardware interface. A second serial device has a receive port and a transmit port. The transmit port of the first serial device is in serial communication with the receive port of the second serial device, and the receive port of the first serial device is in serial communication with the transmit port of the second serial device. Computer-executable instructions emulate serial communication port device communication and include instructions that transmit information over another medium in response to receive requests from the second serial device. The transmitted information includes information representative of the receive request from the second device. Transmissions to the first serial device by the operating system instructions are transmitted over the other medium and serial communication port device communication is thereby emulated over the other medium. The emulation instructions further include instructions, responsive to a communication received from the other medium, that transmit information representative of the received communication to the transmit port of the second serial device. The emulation system communicates with at least one console device. The other medium comprises a packet-based network. The other medium comprises a cell-based network. The operating system communicates directly and solely with the predefined I/O hardware interface.

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Hudson, MA, United States of America

Neil Haley