Patent ID: 7310349
Filing Date: 2007-12-18
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A routing and grade-of-service control mechanism for each switch module of a universal transfer mode (UTM) network having a plurality of switch modules, said each switch module including a plurality of ingress ports, a plurality of egress ports, and a switch fabric, said mechanism comprising: a memory for storing a plurality of sets of candidate routes each said set of candidate routes connecting said each switch module to a designated switch module from among said plurality of switch modules; a routing-request processor at each ingress port of said each switch module for receiving connection requests from traffic sources; and a switch-module routing processor communicatively coupled to said routing-request processor for: wherein said memory, under control of said switch-module routing processor, stores: wherein said switch-module routing processor assigns a cyclic request number for each connection request and said memory further stores for each connection request: an egress processor associated with each egress port in said plurality of egress ports assigns a state indicator to said each egress port, the state indicator being set to “1” to indicate that said each egress port is engaged in a connection setup and set to “0” to indicate that said each egress port is a candidate for a new connection setup; and said indication of route uncommitted capacity for a specific route emanating from a specific egress port of said each swich module is determined as the lesser of a first uncommitted capacity of a link emanating from said specific egress port and a second uncommitted capacity in a subsequent link along said specific route, where an indication of said second uncommitted capacity is received from a corresponding switch module.