System and method for an efficient ATM adapter/device driver interface
US5606559A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | Aug 11, 1995 |
| Grant date | Feb 25, 1997 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Aug 11, 2015 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
- CPC primaryH04L2012/5681
- WIPO fieldTelecommunications
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
An ATM communications network includes a system processor having a device driver and a memory coupled to an adapter at an interface. Frames stored in the memory are transmitted to the network using a transmit ready queue residing in the adapter and defined by transmit control registers. The frames are linked together by descriptors and pointers to received ready lists maintained by the device driver. A transmit frame complete list is established in the system memory using the transmit control registers. An interrupt is generated by the adapter indicating when frame transmission is complete. Simultaneously, cells are received from the network and stored in system memory according to a free buffer list established by the device driver. A pointer is maintained by the device driver to the last entry of the receive free buffer list. The adapter maintains a pointer to the next buffer to be used from the receive free buffer list. A receive ready list is established by the device driver in system memory with the location indicated to the adapter via the receive control registers in the adapter. The receive data cells are reassembled into frames in buffers from the free buffer list. At comp…
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.