Patent · US Expired

Method and apparatus for scheduling packet flow on a fibre channel arbitrated loop

US7215680B2 · kind B2 · utility

58Cited by
5References
47Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateMay 13, 2002
Grant dateMay 8, 2007
Priority date
Expiry dateApr 2, 2025

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04L49/351
  • WIPO fieldDigital communication
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A system and method for enabling a network switch to transmit queued packets to a device when opened by the device, and thus to utilize the Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop (FC-AL) in full-duplex mode when possible. The switch may include a plurality of queues each associated with a device on the FC-AL for queuing incoming packets for the device. The switch may determine a next non-empty queue, open the device associated with the queue, and send packets to the device. The device may send packets to the switch concurrently with receiving packets from the switch, thus utilizing the FC-AL in full-duplex mode. When a device opens the switch to transmit packets to the switch, the switch may determine if there are packets for the device in the queue and, if so, send packets to the device concurrently with receiving packets from the device, thus utilizing the FC-AL in full-duplex mode.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.