Patent ID: 6327246
Filing Date: 2001-12-04
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
An ATM network switch, comprising:a) at least one switch fabric; andb) a plurality of controllers, each controller having,an input link and an output link to said switch fabric,at least one external link to an ATM network,means for receiving ATM cells from the ATM network,means for determining the VC of cells received from the ATM network,a plurality of cell buffer means for separately buffering groups of cells of each VC,means for determining whether each cell received from the ATM network is an ABR cell,means for creating a pointer to each ABR cell, said pointer including an onward transmission time,traffic shaping buffer means for buffering said pointers to said ABR cells,look-up table means for storing an MCR for each ABR VC,means for determining available output bandwidth for ABR traffic,calculating means for calculating an allocated output cell rate for each ABR VC,means for reading pointers from said traffic shaping buffer means,means for comparing the MCR associated with a pointer read from said traffic shaping buffer means with said allocated output cell rate, andmeans for transmitting cells from each of said cell buffer means to another controller via said switch fabric when the MCR associated with a pointer read from said traffic shaping buffer is greater than said allocated output cell rate.