Patent ID: 7197031

Claim:
A method of mapping a data stream through a cross-connect via two or more parallel shelves of a switch core of the cross-connect, wherein each shelf has a respective independent pointer processing state machine, and the data stream comprises either one of Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) and Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH) signals, the method comprising steps of: a) receiving the data stream at an input port of the cross-connect; b) splitting the received data stream into at least two sub-streams; c) modifying at least one sub-stream to emulate a conventional Synchronous Transport System (STS) concatenation with sufficient accuracy to enable successful pointer processing through a shelf: d) mapping each of the sub-streams to a selected output port of the cross-connect via a respective shelf; and e) constructing an output data stream that is equivalent to the received data stream, at the output port, using content of each of the sub-streams.