Patent ID: 7127718

Claim:
An apparatus for controlling a physical layer interface of a network interface card in real time, said apparatus comprising: a first memory capable of storing a multitasking control program, said multitasking control program comprising a main routine and a plurality of subroutines sequentially callable by said main routine; a second memory capable of storing a plurality of multitasking vectors associated with said multitasking control program; and a microcontroller capable of executing said multitasking control program; wherein program execution control is transferred from said main routine to a first one of said plurality of subroutines when said first subroutine is called by said main routine; wherein said first subroutine, upon encountering a decision point in said first subroutine that is not yet capable of being decided, updates a first one of said plurality of multitasking vectors associated with said first subroutine with an address of said decision point and transfers program execution control back to said main routine; and wherein the main routine, after sequentially transferring program execution control to each remaining subroutine in the plurality of subroutines, again transfers program execution control from the main routine to the first subroutine at the address of the decision point contained in the first multitasking vector.