Patent ID: 7386621

Claim:
A method of transferring data from a distributor to a plurality of recipients comprising the steps of: (a) broadcasting a sequential one of a plurality of packets together comprising data to be transferred to said plurality of recipients at a time when each said plurality of recipients is capable of receiving said data by point-to-point communication; (b) repeating step (a) until a time for the completion of transferring said sequential one of a plurality of packets by point-to-point communication with said recipients obtains a predetermined relationship to a time for the completion of said broadcasting, wherein each successive iteration of repeating step (a) is preceded by the steps of: (i) receiving a value from at least one designated representative recipient, each representing at least one other non-representative recipient, said value indicating whether said sequential one of said plurality of packets has been received; (ii) assigning said received value to all recipients respectively represented by said at least one of said designated recipients; and (iii) evaluating whether said predetermined relationship has been attained based on said respective received values and said assigned values; (c) thereafter completing said transferring of said sequential one of a plurality of packets by point-to-point communication with at least one of said plurality of recipients; and (d) repeating steps (a) through (c) for the next sequential one of said plurality of packets until said data has been received by all recipients.