Patent ID: 6877043

Claim:
A method for distributing sets of collision resolution parameters to be used for resolution of network access contention events among nodes of a non-centralized media access control shared medium network, comprising: providing a set of collision resolution parameters which includes a sequence of fixed numbers for resolving a single network access contention event; identifying a single collision signal slot master node when one or more candidate collision signal slot master nodes exist; sending collision signal slot request messages from client nodes addressed to all network nodes, wherein a collision signal slot request message includes: a unique client identifier to indicate source of request; an indication that a collision resolution parameter set is required by a uniquely identified requesting client node; and an indication of number of active packet-generating channels at the uniquely identified requesting client node; sending collision signal slot assignment messages from the master node to the client nodes, wherein a collision signal slot assignment message includes: a list of unique client identifiers to indicate those client nodes which can find collision resolution parameter set information within the collision signal slot assignment message; a list of collision resolution parameter set information unambiguously associated on a one-for-one matching basis with the list of unique client identifiers; obtaining at a given client node from within a received collision signal slot assignment message a collision resolution parameter set to be employed by that given client node; sending collision signal slot acknowledgment messages from client nodes addressed to all network nodes, wherein a collision signal slot acknowledgment message includes: a unique client identifier to indicate source of the collision signal slot acknowledgment message; and collision resolution parameter set information currently assigned to the uniquely identified client node; and sending collision signal slot drop messages from client nodes addressed to all network nodes, wherein a collision signal slot drop message includes: a unique client identifier to indicate source of the collision signal slot drop message; and an indication that a collision resolution parameter set is no longer required by the uniquely identified client node.