Patent ID: 6330239
Filing Date: 2001-12-11
Classification: H04L,H04Q

Abstract:
An exchange apparatus, comprising:address solving means for extracting logical address information from a datagram received from an Internet protocol computer network through a data transmission path and converting the extracted address information into absolute address information of an asynchronous transfer mode network;address converting means for converting the absolute address information converted by said address solving means into an address having a geographically hierarchical structure and adding the converted address information to the original datagram;ATM cell assembling means for assembling an ATM cell that is transferred at a time in the asynchronous transfer mode with the datagram containing the address information added by said address converting means; andtransfer destination setting and outputting means for setting a virtual path and a virtual channel that represent the transfer destination to the ATM cell assembled by said ATM cell assembling means and outputting the resultant ATM cell to the asynchronous transfer mode network,wherein said exchange apparatus is provided at a particular network hierarchicallevel, and wherein said address converting means converts the absolute address information into the address having a geographical hierarchical structure by referring to a routing table that includes routing information of only the particular network hierarchical level and network hierarchical levels immediately above and immediately below the particular network hierarchical level, and wherein the routing table does not include routing information of any other network hierarchical levels.