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:
Apr. 20, 1999
Filed:
Nov. 12, 1996
Charles C Eckhoff, Plano, TX (US);
Oscar A Tovar, Plano, TX (US);
Alcatel USA, Inc., Plano, TX (US);
Abstract
A redundancy switch (44) provides interfacing of network signals to spare network processors (46) in the event of a failure of a main network processor (42). A redundancy switch (44) allows for monitoring and diagnostic operations to be performed on network electrical signals without interrupting traffic flow on inbound and outbound paths. A redundancy switch (44) performs a loopback diagnostic by routing signals from transmitter portions of the spare network processors (46) to selected receiver portions. The redundancy switch (44) includes a receiver interface unit (90) and a transmitter interface unit (92) capable of routing inbound and outbound customer signals to and from the spare processors (46) for monitoring, diagnostic, and sparing purposes.