International Business Machines Corporation

Robert P Lee

Felix H Closs

A demand access broadcast transmission method and means is capable of supporting random port access and any-to-any transmission at very high data rates. A communication medium (FIG. 2) formed from an inverted tree network of nodes (1, 18, 22) and full duplex connecting links (13, 17, 19) permits the establishment of a path lock up-link through the network from a demanding port to a root node on a first-come first-serve demand access basis with arbitration at each distinct tree node level (FIG. 3). Broadcast transmission is perfected down-link over all fan-out paths from the root node. Collision is avoided by locking a path to a port and by limiting race conditions among active ports to only the leading edges of messages. Thus, relinquishment of a broadcast channel overlapped with transmission of a message does not result in path seizure since the occurrence of message leading edges is the singular path connection invoking event.

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Woodstock, NY, United States of America

Robert P Lee