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:
Aug. 07, 2001
Filed:
Jul. 22, 1998
Yoram Ofek, Riverdale, NY (US);
Nachum Shacham, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Abstract
The invention describes a method for transmitting and forwarding packets over a packet switching network. The switches of the network maintain a common time reference, which is obtained either from an external source (such as GPS—Global Positioning System) or is generated and distributed internally. The time intervals are arranged in simple periodicity and complex periodicity (like seconds and minutes of a clock). A packet that arrives to an input port of a switch, is switched to an output port based on specific routing information in the packet header (e.g., IPv4 destination address in the Internet, VCI/VPI labels in ATM). Each switch along a route from a source to a destination forwards packets in periodic time intervals that are predefined using the common time reference. The time interval duration can be longer than the time duration required for transmitting a packet, in which case the exact position of a packet in the time interval is not predetermined.