Patent ID: 6526211
Filing Date: 2003-02-25
Classification: G02B

Abstract:
A system comprising:a chassis having a plurality of card slots; at least one switch card having a plurality of switch card laser transmitter/photodetector pairs, each switch card laser transmitter/photodetector pair comprising a switch card laser transmitter and a switch card photodetector, the switch card inserted into a card slot; at least one feature card having a feature card laser transmitter/photodetector pair, the laser transmitter/photodetector pair comprising a feature card laser transmitter and a feature card photodetector, the at least one feature card inserted into a card slot, the at least one feature card contains apertures such that one of the at least one feature cards will not obstruct the free-space optical data transmission path of the other at least one feature cards; an alignment mechanism to align the at least one feature card such that the feature card laser transmitter aligns with a specified switch card photodetector and the feature card photodetector aligns with a specified switch card laser transmitter; and a plurality of free-space optical data transmission paths such that the feature card laser transmitter can transmit a signal to the specified switch card photodetector and the specified switch card laser transmitter can transmit a signal to the feature card photodetector.