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:
Dec. 06, 1994
Filed:
Aug. 27, 1991
Paul J Brown, Poughkeepsie, NY (US);
Kenneth J Fredericks, Sr, Poughkeepsie, NY (US);
Eugene P Hefferon, Poughkeepsie, NY (US);
Gerald T Moffitt, San Jose, CA (US);
Allan S Meritt, Poughkeepsie, NY (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A method for acquiring the node identifier of a node in a data processing input/output (I/O) system having a plurality of nodes. This procedure is part of the initialization of each node in the I/O system and may be used to establish the configuration of the I/O system such that if a connection breaks or a fault occurs between nodes, the configuration can be confirmed after the break or fault is corrected. This prevents data from being sent to the wrong device if lines were connected in a different configuration during the correction of a fault. The node identifier is a worldwide-unique identifier such that only one node is identified by a node identifier. The node identifier contains a validity code that specifies if the node identifier is valid. Also disclosed is a retry procedure for retrying the acquisition of a node identifier if the acquired node identifier is not valid, and a deferral procedure which defers the retry procedure if a link is not available.