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:
Nov. 10, 1998
Filed:
Jun. 07, 1995
Howard Thomas Olnowich, Endwell, NY (US);
Jehoshua Bruck, La Canada, CA (US);
James William Feeney, Endicott, NY (US);
Michael Hans Fisher, Rochester, MN (US);
Eliezer Upfal, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Arthur Robert Williams, Croton-On-Hudson, NY (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
The present invention addresses the limitations of prior art ALLNODE switches by including dual priority, adaptive, path seeking, and flash-flood functionalities in a single ALLNODE switch. The switch of the present invention further includes a selection device responsive to a selection signal for enabling the selection of the mode of switch operation from any one of the foregoing functionalities. The selection signal is applied to the switch in a number of different ways including: the transmission of a command over the data path interface to the switch; the transmission of a command over special purpose serial or parallel control lines; or via hardwiring. Thus, the selection of functionality for the switch is capable of being made in either a dynamic or static fashion. The present invention further comprises two new high performance networks utilizing the selectable function ALLNODE switch. The networks have a different functionality being performed at each stage, and comprise a 'Multi-Dilated Path Seeking Network' and a 'Nested Path Seeking and Flash-Flood Network.'