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:
May. 13, 2003
Filed:
Oct. 21, 1999
Philip D. Olson, Kenwood, CA (US);
Ulysses ESD, Inc., San Jose, CA (US);
Abstract
A backplane apparatus provides board address information for each board inserted in the slots of the backplane, using a single pin in the backplane slot. A unique address for a board in a backplane slot is identified by an analog address signal, which can be communicated on a single line and therefore requires only one pin in the backplane slot or in the device which will read the address information. The analog address signal is a function of a component, such as a resistor or a capacitor, coupled to the address pin in the backplane slot. A predefined characteristic of the component, such as the resistance or the capacitance, is unique for each slot. The component characteristic is converted into a corresponding characteristic of the analog address signal, such as the voltage, current, frequency or the slope of a voltage or current ramp, so that the analog address signal is measurably different for every slot.