Communication switching module for the transmission and control of audio, video, and computer data over a single network fabric

• US 6,577,631 B1
• Filed: 06/08/1999
• Issued: 06/10/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 06/10/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Network-1 Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Merlot Communications Incorporated
• Inventors: Keenan, Ronald M., Barraza, Thomas F., Caceres, Edward R., Deptula, Joseph A., Evans, Patrick A., Setaro, Joseph
• Primary Examiner(s): Patel, Ajit
• Assistant Examiner(s): SHAH, CHIRAG G
• Application Number:
  US09/327,928
• Time in Patent Office: 1,463 Days
• Field of Search: 370/389,474,493,352,465,394
• US Class Current: 370/394
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/40013 Details regarding a bus controller
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/4035 in which slots of a TDMA packet structure are assigned based on a contention resolution carried out at a master unit TDM/TDMA multiplex systems per se H04J3/1694; hybrid switching systems H04L12/64
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/413 with random access, e.g. carrier-sense multiple-access with collision detection [CSMA-CD]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/6418 Hybrid transport
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/644 Star
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/6443 Network Node Interface, e.g. Routing, Path finding
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/6454 Random, e.g. Ethernet
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/6459 Multiplexing, e.g. TDMA, CDMA
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/6475 N-ISDN, Public Switched Telephone Network [PSTN]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/6481 Speech, voice
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/13 in a LAN segment, e.g. ring or bus
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2416 Real-time traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/205 Quality of Service based
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/254 Centralised controller, i.e. arbitration or scheduling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/3027 Output queuing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/351 for local area network [LAN], e.g. Ethernet switches
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/006 Networks other than PSTN/ISDN providing telephone service, e.g. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) , including next generation networks with a packet-switched transport layer H04L65/00 takes precedence; aspects not specific to the type of network H04M3/00; special services in those networks H04M3/42

Abstract

A communications switching module (CSM) serving as common switching equipment for work stations in a star-topology Ethernet local area network. Both voice and data are incorporated in master Ethernet packets which are transmitted at a constant rate. The CSM switches the voice signals synchronously over a time domain multiplexed highway and separately switches the data signals asynchronously over a high speed packet bus.

Claims

1. A communication switching module (CSM) to be used for common switching equipment in a local area network (LAN) adapted for packet switching of Ethernet packets, said CSM comprising:

a plurality of Ethernet switch cards each having a plurality of user ports and first switching means for directing said Ethernet packets to and from selected user ports,

means for segmentation and reassembly (SAR) of said Ethernet packets received by and transmitted to the user ports operatively connected to said first switching means, said SAR means being adapted to segment received data of a first delay-sensitive data type and received data of a second non-delay sensitive data type, to encapsulate the segmented data into master Ethernet packets at fixed locations in said master Ethernet packets according to data type, to extract segments of the first and second data types from said packets, and to re-assemble the extracted segments into the first and second data types, and to transmit said master Ethernet packets at a selected constant rate,

time domain multiplexing (TDM) means connected to the SAR means for synchronous processing of data of said first data type, and

second switching means connected to the SAR means for asynchronous processing of data of said second data type.

2. Apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the time domain multiplexing means comprises a plurality of TDM flow queues, a full duplex TDM backplane highway interfaced with said TDM flow queues, and a constant bit rate (CBR) processing module interfaced with the TDM backplane highway.

3. Apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the second switching means comprises a plurality of packet flow queues, a high speed full duplex packet bus interfaced with said packet flow queues, and an Ethernet switch fabric card interfaced with said packet bus.

4. Apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the Ethernet switch fabric card comprises a cut-through Ethernet switch.

5. Apparatus according to claim 1, where the first switching means comprises a store-and forward Ethernet switch.

6. Apparatus according to claim 1, including at least one wide area network (WAN) interface card having at least one port connectable for full duplex high speed digital data service transmission, said WAN interface card being connected to the SAR means.

7. Apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the SAR means is adapted to segment data of the first data type into segments having a selected fixed number of octets and to encapsulate each first data type segment into said master Ethernet packet at a selected fixed location.

8. Apparatus according to claim 7, wherein the SAR means is adapted to segment data of the second data type into segments having said selected fixed number of octets and to encapsulate each segment of the second data type into a master Ethernet packet at a fixed location contiguous to a said segment of the first data type.

9. Apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the SAR means is adapted to extract segments of the first data type from said master Ethernet packets and to re-assemble data of the first data type and forward it to said TDM means.

10. Apparatus according to claim 9, wherein the SAR means is adapted to extract segments of the second data type and to re-assemble data of the second type and forward it to said second switching means.