Patent ID: 7982335

Claim:
A power strip, comprising: a power rail having a power bus capable of distributing up to three phase AC power and a communications bus including a plurality of power bus conductors and a plurality of communications bus conductors recessed in an longitudinally extending chassis that run through the chassis along the length of the chassis, the power bus including a hot conductor for each of the three phases (L 1 , L 2 , L 3 ), a neutral conductor and a ground conductor; a power entry module received on the power rail, the power entry module having a power inlet to which a source of power can be coupled, a plurality of power entry module power bus terminals that mate with the power bus conductors of the power rail and a plurality of power entry module communications bus terminals that mate with the communications bus conductors of the power rail; a plurality of receptacle modules receivable on the power rail, each receptacle module including a plurality of receptacle module power terminals that mate with the power bus conductors of the power rail, each receptacle module having data communications capability having a plurality of receptacle module communications bus terminals that mate with the communications bus conductors of the power rail, each receptacle module having a plurality of plug receptacles, each receptacle module mounted on the power rail distributing AC power from the power rail to its plug receptacles; the receptacle modules selectable from receptacle modules having a plurality of different characteristics; the power entry module including a communications module that conducts a discovery process when a receptacle module having data communication capability is mounted on the power rail, the communication module querying that receptacle module via the communications bus to determine whether that receptacle module had a unique identifier assigned to it and if not, assigns a unique identifier to that receptacle module that the communications module sends to the receptacle module via the communications bus and that the receptacle module stores in a memory of the receptacle module, the communications module via the communications bus retrieving from that receptacle module information indicative of the characteristics of that receptacle module and a location of that receptacle module on the power rail that the communications module stores in a memory of the communications module, the communications module maintaining in memory of the communications module an inventory of each receptacle module mounted on the power rail to which the communication module assigned a unique identifier that includes the information indicative of the characteristics of each such receptacle module and its location on the power rail.