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. 29, 2003
Filed:
Jul. 21, 1998
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
In a communication network for transferring signals, e.g. according to the SONET or SDH standards, interconnecting node devices are provided consisting of parallel processing modules ( -T, -R). A plurality of processing modules with first and second interfaces rearrange/insert/extract tributary signals and configurable multiplexing/de-multiplexing components enable each processing module to access any portion of an arbitrarily preselected tributary signal. In a SONET/SDH system, signals between SONET/SDH frames are rearranged on incoming ( ) and outgoing ( ) main lines=Digital Cross-Connect, or tributary signals are transferred between frames and local lines ( -i-T, -i-R)=Add/Drop Function. The system provides configurable multiplexing/de-multiplexing components ( -i, -i, -i, -i) which allow the processing modules to have access to any tributary signals in said frames, thus enabling digital cross-connect and add/drop operations without completely demultiplexing or disassembling frames. In a preferred embodiment, the configurable multiplexing/demultiplexing component includes a pipeline arrangement ( -i, -i) connected to all processing modules ( -T, -R).