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. 09, 1999
Filed:
Jul. 11, 1997
Christopher C Lord, Princeton, MA (US);
David B Schwartz, Framingham, MA (US);
Marathon Technologies Corporation, Boxboro, MA (US);
Abstract
Failures in a fault-tolerant computer system which includes two or more input/output processors connected to a data communication system are detected by monitoring data communication. The computer system is able to detect failures associated with a primary input/output processor, as well as with a standby input/output processors, and is also able to discriminate between failures of the input/output processors and communication failures in the data communication network itself. In addition to using heartbeat-like transmissions, various other categories of data communication are also used to detect failures. The system is able to detect failures when the input/output processors are on a common network segment, allowing the processors to monitor identical data traffic, as well as when the processors are on different segments where, as a result of filtering behavior of network elements such as active hubs, the processors may not be able to monitor identical data traffic.