Patent ID: 7321633

Claim:
An encoder, comprising: a constituent trellis encoder that receives a plurality of input bits; and a rate control sequencer operably coupled to the constituent trellis encoder that selects a first rate control sequence from a plurality of rate control sequences based on at least one of a bandwidth requirement of a communication channel and a Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) of the communication channel; and wherein: the constituent trellis encoder encodes at least some of the plurality of input bits, according to the first rate control sequence, to generate a plurality of encoded symbols; a first rate control of the first rate control sequence directs a first encoded symbol of the plurality of encoded symbols to be symbol mapped to a first constellation having a corresponding first mapping; a second rate control of the first rate control sequence directs a second encoded symbol of the plurality of encoded symbols to be symbol mapped to a second constellation having a corresponding second mapping; the plurality of encoded symbols is provided to the communication channel; and based upon a change in at least one of the bandwidth requirement and the SNR, the rate control sequencer selects a second rate control sequence from the plurality of rate control sequences for use in place of the first rate control sequence during subsequent encoding of at least some input bits of the plurality of input bits.