Switching network control circuit
AssigneeAT&T Bell Laboratories
InventorsWalter P. Christmas, Bruce W. Sanders
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Electronic business communication systems are generally comprised of a number of independent switching modules each of which is comprised of a time slot interchange circuit. These time slot interchange circuits are all interconnected by a separate central switching network. The subject switching network control arrangement provides a flexible method of interconnecting the subscribers served by the telephone switching system and, in particular, of summing the conversations of various conferees in a conference call situation to thereby minimize the traffic in the central switching network as well as provide various feature enhancements.
Claims10
In a switching system which serves a plurality of communication circuits (T40-T78) each of which is connected by an associated one of a plurality of port circuits (140-178) to a switching network (101-103) of said switching system, which switching network (101-103) establishes communication connections among said port circuits (140-178) by controllably exchanging digital call signals among said port circuits (140-178), a method of controlling said switching network (101-103) comprising the steps of:
- monitoring said port circuits (140-178) for service requests;
- creating a plurality of functionally equivalent sets of response operations to satisfy said service requests;
- selecting one of said sets of response operations;
- converting said selected set of response operations into a network map of circuit interconnections;
- and
- controlling said switching network (101-103) to establish said communication connections based on said network map.
In a switching system which serves a plurality of communication circuits (T40-T78), each of which is connected by an associated one of a plurality of port circuits (140-178) to a switching network (101-103) of said switching system, which switching network establishes communication connections among said port circuits (140-178) by controllably exchanging digital call signals among said port circuits (140-178), a switching network control system comprising:
- system processor means (100) responsive to service requests from said port circuits (140-178) for creating a plurality of sets of response operations to implement said service requests;
- and
- connection manager means (106) responsive to a select one of said sets of response operations for converting said select set of response operations into a network map of circuit interconnections to implement said service requests;
- operations into a network map of circuit interconnections to implement said service requests;
- wherein said switching network (101-103) is responsive to said network map of circuit interconnections for distributing digital call signals among said port circuits as defined by said network map.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.