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:
Jan. 30, 2001
Filed:
Feb. 05, 1998
James Ruane, San Jose, CA (US);
James S. Binder, San Jose, CA (US);
Glenn William Connery, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Robert Pickering, Bucks, GB;
3Com Corporation, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Abstract
A method by which a pair of communicating network equipment drivers can determine if the equipment they control such as a network adapter or a switch port are directly connected by a single network cable, is applicable to network protocols which include a link active signaling technique as part of the physical layer specification. The method includes determining whether the link is in a first state in which there is only one device coupled to the link without intervening devices which are members of a particular class, or in a second state in which there may be more than one device coupled to the link without intervening devices which are members of the particular class. If the link is in the first state, then a physical layer test involving the physical layer link active signaling mechanism is executed to ensure that the responding device is coupled to the same link without intervening devices that are not members of the particular class.