Prioritized data packet communication
First Claim
1. In a data communication system comprising a plurality of transmission media connected by a plurality of bus interface units to a plurality of communicating devices, the improvement wherein each of said bus interface units dynamically determines which of said transmission media is used for transmitting information by each of said communicating devices.
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Abstract
A method of communicating data in a multinodal peer network communication system is disclosed in which the data is transmitted in accordance with an established priority scheme. The method uses two techniques to ensure that higher priority data is transmitted before lower priority data. In one technique, decreasing priority time-windows are established by each node of the system following the end of a transmission on a shared transmission medium. Subsequently, data is transmitted when the priority of the data matches or exceeds the priority of the time-window. In the other technique, data collisions on the shared medium are resolved by use of the priority time-window technique in combination with the use of a pseudo-random back-off timer.
82 Citations
8 Claims
- 1. In a data communication system comprising a plurality of transmission media connected by a plurality of bus interface units to a plurality of communicating devices, the improvement wherein each of said bus interface units dynamically determines which of said transmission media is used for transmitting information by each of said communicating devices.
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5. A method for allocating usage of a transmission medium shared by plural communicating units in accordance with the relative priority of messages sent over the medium, comprising the steps of:
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(a) assigning a priority number to each message; (b) establishing independently of the number of communicating units sharing the transmission medium a plurality of priority time windows when the transmission medium becomes inactive; (c) delaying the use of the transmission medium for sending a particular message until the period of time equal to the priority time window corresponding to the priority number of the message has elapsed; and
,(d) sending the message if the transmission medium is still inactive after the delay. - View Dependent Claims (6)
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7. In a data communication system comprising a plurality of transmission media and a plurality of communicating devices, a method for addressing messages which will be selectively received and accepted by either only one receiver, only predetermined groups of receivers, or all receivers, comprising the steps of:
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(a) providing a plurality of receiver addresses for each said communication device, wherein at least one of said addresses is unque for each said communicating device and others of said addresses may be shared by a plurality of said communicating devices; (b) providing each said communicating device with a receiver address shared by all said communicating devices; and
,(c) transmitting data across said transmission media wherein said data includes the address of said communicating device or devices to receive the message. - View Dependent Claims (8)
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Specification