Patent ID: 8542708

Claim:
A method for transporting a constant bit rate (CBR) data stream comprising: at an ingress element: measuring a CBR clock rate for an input CBR stream and generating segment size decisions such that said segment size decisions vary dependent on said CBR clock rate; dividing said CBR stream into variable size segments using said segment size decisions; transmitting said variable size segments to an egress element; and at said egress element: receiving said variable size segments; determining size indications dependent on the size of each variable size segment; and reconstructing said CBR stream from said variable size segments at a rate adjusted to match said CBR clock rate based on the variation in sizes of said size indications, wherein said measuring step comprises determining that said CBR clock rate is greater than, less than or equal to an approximated base CBR clock rate derived from a local reference clock and wherein said dividing step comprises sizing any given segment to be larger than, less than or equal to a base size indicative of said approximated base CBR clock rate, and wherein said approximated base CBR clock rate is defined using integers C and T ref , where C is a base segment size in bytes and T ref is a number of local reference clock cycles such that said approximated base CBR clock rate in bits per second is given by C*8/T ref .