Patent ID: 7184443

Claim:
A method, comprising: identifying a set of requests of a plurality of possible requests, the set of requests corresponding to packets desired to be sent from a plurality of inputs across a packet switch to a particular output; maintaining a grant starting position identifying a position in a predetermined sequence of said possible requests; determining a grant advancement position identifying a position in the predetermined sequence of said possible requests corresponding of one of the requests in the set of requests, the grant advancement position identifying a different position than the grant starting position; and granting a first n requests from the set of requests in the predetermined sequence starting from the grant starting position, where n is less than or equal to the maximum number of packets that can be sent in a single packet time to the particular output; accepting one or more of said grants; and sending packets corresponding to said acceptances; wherein the grant starting position is updated in response to determining, after said granting operation, that said granted requests include a particular grant corresponding to the grant advancement position else the grant starting position is not updated; and wherein packets corresponding to said acceptances are sent from their respective said inputs.