Patent ID: 6389024
Filing Date: 2002-05-14
Classification: H04Q

Abstract:
A communications network comprising:(A) a plurality of switching nodes each of which contains line cards with multiple ports for connections between the communications network and subscriber lines or other switching systems, and objects for processing calls on channels associated with each port; (B) an internal network interconnecting the switching nodes for conveying switched telecommunications data between them; (C) a host computer that includes software applications which exercise supervisory control over the nodes; (D) a host network linking the host computer with the switching nodes; (E) a programmable router that utilizes a configurable routing table to route calls based on predefined routing criteria, said routing table including multiple entries each having multiple fields, a first field in each entry specifying one of a set of routing criteria, a second field in each entry specifying a group of ports to which a call may be routed and/or one or more of the other entries whose first fields are examined to determine whether call parameters match the criteria in those fields, and a field containing a route group identifier for indentifying entries having certain common criteria, and wherein said entries in said router table also include: (i) a route number field for indexing the routing table; (ii) a route property field for identifying a route type mask or range; (iii) the first field which is a criterion type field for specifying one of a set of routing criteria types; (iv) a criterion data length field for storing the length of routing criteria data and mask; (v) a routing criteria data field for storing predefined routing criteria data; (vi) a criterion data mask field for specifying which digits in the routing criteria data field to consider when routing a call; (vii) a logical data count field for specifying the number of sets of logical data in the logical data field; and (viii) the second field which is a logical data field for storing sets of logical data which identify a call-termination channel group, said logical data field may also specify other entries in the routing table; and (F) means for logically combining values in routing table fields based on the results obtained by examining the other entries identified by the second field.