Patent ID: 7106697

Claim:
A method implemented in a switching system having a scheduler and a plurality of ports: (a) each of the plurality of ports receiving a demand request from the scheduler; (b) each of the plurality of ports calculating a series of port schedules, wherein each port schedule defines a set of port-to-port connections for transferring data from a corresponding one of the plurality of ports; (c) receiving a series of port schedules from each port; (d) upon receiving a first-choice port schedule from each port, determining whether an aggregation of the first-choice port schedules forms a valid system schedule; (e) if the aggregation forms a valid system schedule, implementing the aggregation; (f) if the aggregation does not form a valid system schedule, discarding at least a portion of the aggregation, receiving a next-choice port schedule from each port, replacing the discarded portion with corresponding portions of the next-choice schedules and determining whether the aggregation of the port schedules forms a valid system schedule; and (g) repeating (f) until the aggregation of the port schedules forms a valid system schedule.