The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 08, 1992
Filed:
Dec. 17, 1990
Louis R Goke, Austin, TX (US);
Gary J Grimes, Thornton, CO (US);
AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ (US);
Abstract
A time slot converter for communicating multi-rate data on a single channel by using multiple time slots. By utilizing multiple replications of the time slot converter, any size time division switching unit such as time slot interchangers or time multiplexer switches may be assembled. The time slot converter has a plurality of switching elements and a switching element uses a time accounting arrangement that has the same overhead in assigning multiple time slots to a channel as in assigning one time slot to a channel. The switching element requires less buffer storage because each time slot has only one bit, and it is not necessary to store multiple frames. In addition, switching delay is reduced, since the delay due to buffering is always less than a frame period. Data order is maintained by using time slots for high capacity channels that are equally spaced in time and whose order is guaranteed. Also, the utlization of equally spaced time slots eliminates the need for output and input buffering to and from endpoint terminals.