Adaption resource module and operating method therefor

A method of providing signal processing to a plurality of channels incident to a processing farm containing a plurality of slave elements each having a signal processing capability and a master control element both coupled to the plurality of slave elements and arranged to receive the plurality of information-bearing channels, the method comprising the steps of:

• providing the master control element with a routing function that selectively routes information-bearing channels to specified ones of the plurality of slave processing elements;
• receiving an information-bearing channel;
• and
• applying the routing function to distribute signal processing of at least some of the
• plurality of information-bearing channels between the plurality of slave elements;
• wherein the master processing element dynamically varies the distribution of information-bearing channels according to instantaneous signal processing demand of each individual information-bearing channel.

A method of providing signal processing to a plurality of information-bearing channels incident to an interface having a routing device coupled to a plurality of processing platforms each arranged to support signal network inter-working functions bi-directionally between a narrowband network and a broadband network, the method comprising the steps of:

• in the routing device, dynamically varying distribution of the plurality of information-bearing channels between the plurality of processing platforms and according to instantaneous signal processing demand of each individual information-bearing channels;
• and
• applying processing to at least some of the information-bearing channels in a processing platform to which the information-bearing channels have been routed;
• wherein said signal network inter-working functions including at least one of:
• signal extraction;
• time detection;
• echo cancellation;
• and ATM adaptation.