Data communication apparatus with distributed traffic protection switching system
AssigneeNortel Networks Limited
InventorsDino B. Fatica, Pierre Coll
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A data communication apparatus having a plurality of working ports for exchanging data traffic with network elements and a plurality of protection ports. The data communication apparatus further includes at least one protection switching functional element operative to perform a plurality of protection switching processes in parallel for switching data traffic from failed working ports to respective protection ports.
Claims22
1) A data communication apparatus, comprising:
- a) a plurality of working ports for exchanging data traffic with network elements;
- c) a plurality of protection ports;
- d) at least one protection switching functional element operative to perform a plurality of protection switching processes in parallel for switching data traffic from a plurality of failed working ports to respective protection ports.
12) A data communication apparatus, comprising:
- a) a plurality of port cards implementing working ports for exchanging data traffic with network elements and a plurality of protection ports;
- b) a protection switching system including a plurality of protection switching functional elements, said protection switching functional elements re siding in at least several ones of said port cards, when one or more of said working ports fail said protection switching functional elements being operative to perform protection switching processes for switching data traffic from the one or more failed working ports to respective protection ports.
13) A data communication apparatus, comprising:
- a) a plurality of working port means for exchanging data traffic with network element means;
- e) a plurality of protection port means;
- f) at least one protection switching means operative to perform a plurality of protection switching processes in parallel for switching data traffic from a plurality of failed working port means to respective protection port means.
14) A port card for a data communication apparatus, comprising:
- a) at least one working port;
- b) a port card functional element in communication with said at least one working port;
- c) a failure detector for sensing a failure of said at least one working port;
- d) a configuration memory in communication with said failure detector, said configuration memory including configuration data identifying a protection entity;
- e) when said failure detector senses a failure of said at least one working port, said failure detector communicating with said configuration memory to extract said configuration data and use said configuration data to construct a control message for dispatch to the protection entity to notify the protection entity that said at least one working port has failed.
17) A port card for a data communication apparatus, comprising:
- a) a protection port;
- b) a protection switching functional element in communication with said protection port;
- c) said protection switching functional element being responsive to a control message conveying a notification of a failure of a working port to implement a protection switching process to switch data traffic from the working port to said protection port.
22) A method for performing protection switching in a data communication apparatus, including:
- a) a plurality of working ports for exchanging data traffic with network elements;
- b) a plurality of protection ports;
- c) said method comprising:
- a. sensing when several ones of the plurality of working ports fail;
- b. perform a plurality of protection switching processes in parallel for switching data traffic from the failed working ports to respective protection ports.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.