Patent ID: 8811418

Claim:
An information processing apparatus which circulates a packet in one way among a plurality of modules connected in a ring shape, and transmits and receives the packet, each of said plurality of modules comprising a reception unit adapted to receive the packet, a determination unit adapted to determine whether data contained in the packet received by said reception unit is processing data to be processed by a processing module of the module or configuration data for changing settings of the processing module by an internally contained command, a discrimination unit adapted to, at least, discriminate, when said determination unit determines that the data contained in the packet is the configuration data, a command type indicating a type of command contained within the configuration data as a write mode in which the configuration data is written in the module, a read mode in which currently set configuration data held in the module is read out from the module, or an exchange mode in which the currently set configuration data is read out from the module, and then the configuration data is written in the module, a decision unit adapted to decide a packet transmission interval from the module based on the command type discriminated by said discrimination unit, a setting unit adapted to set, in a timer, the packet transmission interval decided by said decision unit, and a transmission unit adapted to transmit the packet at the packet transmission interval set in the timer by said setting unit.