Patent ID: 6980531

Claim:
A communication system comprising: transmission equipment that is assigned to a particular origination path, encodes user signals originating at or near the transmission equipment based on the origination path and a particular destination path, and transmits the encoded user signals on the particular origination path; switching equipment that receives the encoded user signals on the particular origination path, routes the encoded user signals at a path level, and transmits the encoded user signals on the particular destination path; and reception equipment that is assigned to the particular destination path, receives the encoded user signals on the particular destination path, and decodes the user signals; wherein the switching equipment includes a controller that dynamically re-routes the encoded user signals received from the transmission equipment to alternative switching equipment that receives the re-routed, encoded, user signals, routes the re-routed, encoded, user signals at a user level and transmits the re-routed encoded user signals to the reception equipment.