US 5,396,495 A · Hub management bus architecture for repeater interface controller

Abstract

The present invention is directed to various features of a repeater interface controller (RIC) that connects segments of a bus/tree local area network. In the described embodiment of the invention, the RIC implements the IEEE 802.3 repeater specification. In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, the RIC provides hub management support in the form of information regarding the status of its ports and of the packets it is repeating. This data is available in three forms: counted events, recorded events and status packets. This information is available through the RIC's interface. The counters and event recording registers have user-definable masks which enable them to be configured to count and record a variety of events. In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, the RIC management statistics at maximum network bandwidth. Statistics are logged while a packet repetition is in process and are furnished to counter and flag arrays after transmission of the same packet has ended. The independent operations of logging and furnishing the information allows management statistics gathering of successive packets with minimal interframe gaps.

Claims23

Dependent claims

A repeater interface controller connectable to a plurality of segments of a local area network for repeating information packets therebetween, the information packets having at least one characteristic that specifies an associated event, the repeater interface controller comprising:

a plurality of port nodes, each port node being connectable to a corresponding segment of the local area network for transferring information packets between said corresponding segment and said port node, each port node including an event record register that responds to information packets transferred by said port node by recording the associated events and maintaining an event record thereof and an event counter that responds to information packets transferred by said port node by counting the associated events and maintaining a count value thereof;
an event bus connected to each of the port nodes;
and
a hub management unit connected to the event bus for retrieving event records and count values from the port nodes.

1 more element

A repeater interface controller connectable to a plurality of segments of a local area network for repeating information packets therebetween, the repeater interface controller comprising:

a plurality of port nodes, each port node being connected to a corresponding segment of the local area network for receiving information packets from said corresponding segment and for transmitting repeated information packets to said corresponding segment;
a central node connected to each of the port nodes, said central node including a central node receiver for receiving information packets from the port nodes, repeater means responsive to receipt of information packets by the central node receiver for generating repeated information packets, and a central node transmitter for transmitting repeated information packets to the port nodes;
management means responsive to information packets received by the repeater interface controller via the port nodes, the management means including (i) event storage means responsive to said received information packets for recording events associated with said received information packets and for maintaining event records thereof and (ii) event counter means responsive to said received information packets for counting said associated events and for maintaining a count value thereof.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Hub management bus architecture for repeater interface controller

Life of this patent

Hub management bus architecture for repeater interface controller

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims23