Patent ID: 7657019

Claim:
In a system having a switching device in a first location, and an extending device in a second location, wherein the extending device extends functionality of the switching device to the second location, a method of providing a communications link between (i) a first phone associated with the extending device and (ii) a PSTN trunk port, the method comprising: analyzing parameters associated with the first phone and the PSTN trunk port so as to determine that the first phone and the PSTN trunk port are local to the second location and are a pair for the intended call; separating signaling data associated with the communications link from voice traffic associated with the communications link; directing the signaling data through the switching device via an extension link between the switching device and the extending device; directing the voice traffic between the first phone and the PSTN trunk port; analyzing the parameters associated with the first phone and the PSTN trunk port with a voice matching pair algorithm, so as to determine that the first phone and the PSTN trunk port are a pair for the intended call; and managing bandwidth within the extension link between the switching device and the extending device by dividing the extension link bandwidth into distinct partitions.