Distributed intelligence MAC protocols for DWDM ring networks

摘要

A metropolitan access network (10) uses a variation of a MAC protocol, where each station (14) on a ring (12) is associated with one or more time slot (30). Each slot carries information regarding the associated station, basic connection fields (32), communications fields (34), and quality of service fields (36). Each station maintains its own local database regarding the status of the network (10) by reading the information in each time slot (30).