Patent ID: 7417995

Claim:
An interworking device for supporting service interworking between an Ethernet communication network and a frame relay network, the service interworking device including: a first network interface operable to communicate with the Ethernet communication network using an Ethernet communication protocol; a second network interface operable to communicate with the frame relay communication network using a frame relay protocol; and a processing unit in communication with the first network interface and the second network interface, the processing unit: terminating frames received from a one of the frame relay communication network and the Ethernet communication network; mapping parameters corresponding to the received one of the frame relay and Ethernet frames into the other of the frame relay and Ethernet frames, the mapped parameters including circuit configuration control plane information and data plane parameters corresponding to individual frames, the circuit configuration control plane information including at least one of connection mapping information, class of service mapping information, and traffic parameters information, the class of service mapping being used by the processing unit to establish the data plane mapping parameters during frame processing.