System and method for efficient initialization of a ring network
US6081847A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Feb 27, 1998 |
| Grant date | Jun 27, 2000 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Feb 27, 2018 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
- CPC primaryH04L12/433
- WIPO fieldDigital communication
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
A Fibre Channel network is provided with an efficient implementation of the loop initialization process. In one embodiment, the network comprises nodes coupled by unidirectional serial communications links in a ring topology. The nodes typically include a serial communications transceiver, a transmit controller, a receive controller, and a memory unit. The serial communications transceiver operates to drive transmit signals on the outgoing serial communications link and to buffer receive signals from the incoming serial communications link. The memory unit includes transmit and receive buffers that are coupled to the transceiver via transmit and receive controllers. One or more of the nodes may also include a control register having an "autoswap" bit. The autoswap bit is initially reset to 0 when the node enters the initialization mode. When the autoswap bit is set to 1, the transmit and receive buffers exchange roles after every data frame so that received initialization data frames stored in the receive buffer are retransmitted by the transmitter controller. When the autoswap bit is not set, a comparison between the original transmitted initialization data frame and the received …
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.