Patent ID: 9282046
Filing Date: 2016-03-08
CPC Classification: H04L

Claim Text:
1. A machine implemented method for a network device, comprising: determining when a smoothing first-in first out (FIFO) memory coupled to a network link for receiving information has reached an upper threshold value to prevent an overrun condition at the smoothing FIFO; wherein the network device includes a plurality of base-ports, each base-port includes a plurality of sub-ports and each sub-port is coupled to a network link from among a plurality of network links; and wherein the smoothing FIFO is used to temporarily store information at a first clock rate and information is read from the smoothing FIFO at a second clock rate; and wherein for receiving and sending information to and from another device, in a first configuration one of the sub-ports is configured to operate as a first independent port coupled to one network link and in a second configuration more than one sub-port, each coupled to one network link, are configured to jointly operate as a second independent port; identifying deletable entries, when the upper threshold value is reached; deleting the deletable entries based on the first configuration and the second configuration; rotating network links for the second configuration, based on a number of deletable entries and which network link smoothing FIFO has a deletable entry; determining that a lower threshold value has been reached to prevent underrun condition at the smoothing FIFO, when the upper threshold value has not been reached; determining frame gaps to insert characters, when the lower threshold has been reached; and inserting information at frame gaps, wherein to maintain order, a character is inserted for each network link in the second configuration in one clock cycle and more than one clock cycle, depending on a number of characters and which network link smoothing FIFO is where a first character is inserted.