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:
Jul. 20, 2004
Filed:
Jun. 15, 1999
Thad W. Lowe, Tulsa, OK (US);
Brian Christian Smith, Broken Arrow, OK (US);
Telstrat International, Plano, TX (US);
Abstract
A method and apparatus are provided for efficiently managing bandwidth operative in a digital loop carrier system. The system includes service cards connectable to at least one transport card having a given bandwidth capacity. Each of the service cards supports multiple subscriber channels. Upon initiation of a first call, the system allocates the call to a given time slot of the transport card. The given time slot is assigned a given default bandwidth, e.g., 64 kbps. While the first call is in progress, the system determines whether the call is voice or data. If the first call is voice, the system may selectively reduce the given default bandwidth allocated to the first call if necessary to ensure that a second call, if initiated while the first call remains in progress, can be assigned the given default bandwidth. Efficient bandwidth management is provided by an inventive linked list optimization scheme, which includes a linked list of words, each associated with a time slot. The linked list is periodically searched to identify words whose associated time slots have not been analyzed to determine if a call allocated to the time slot is a voice or data call. To increase processing efficiency, only the identified time slots are analyzed.