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:
May. 21, 1996
Filed:
Aug. 09, 1993
Joseph B Lyles, Mountain View, CA (US);
Alan G Bell, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Xerox Corporation, Stamford, CT (US);
Abstract
A switching network having a sorting network followed by a plurality of routing networks for routing packets from a plurality of inputs to a plurality of outputs in accordance with destination addresses specified by the packets includes a reservation ring mechanism for resolving conflicts among inputs contending for access to identical outputs. This reservation ring mechanism performs a sequence of step and compare operations in top-to-bottom ring-like order during one or more arbitration cycles for granting contending inputs access to the outputs for which those inputs are contending in top-to-bottom order. Each of the routing networks can route packets from any input to any output, so up to k packets are routed to each output during each arbitration cycle, where k equals the number of routing networks that are employed.