Patent ID: 8040899

Claim:
A method for implementing automatic protection switching (APS) in a device having an Ethernet switching fabric, the method comprising: (a) configuring first and second packet network interfaces of a device containing an Ethernet protocol switching fabric and a voice server to respectively function as working and protection APS interfaces of an APS group; (b) configuring the Ethernet switching fabric to replicate egress media packets from the voice server to the working and protection APS interfaces, such that identical media packets are transmitted from the device to the same network destination by both the working APS interface and the protection APS interface; and (c) configuring the voice server to send media packets using an APS implementation scheme recognized by the Ethernet switching fabric, the APS implementation scheme including a multicast implementation scheme, a port mirroring implementation scheme, or a virtual local area network (VLAN) implementation scheme; wherein configuring the Ethernet switching fabric to replicate egress media packets from the voice server to the working and protection APS interfaces includes configuring the voice server to encapsulate at least one ATM cell intended for one of the working and protection APS interfaces in an Ethernet frame addressed to a VLAN corresponding to the working and protection APS interfaces and to a broadcast Ethernet address and configuring the Ethernet switching fabric to replicate Ethernet frames addressed to the VLAN and the broadcast Ethernet address to the working and protection APS interfaces.