LOW DELAY ATM SWITCHING SYSTEM USING IDLE CELLS STAMPED WITH REFERENCE TIME

摘要

In a multi-stage switching system, a time stamp is attached to eachcell at an entry point of the system indicating the time of arrival of thecell, and the cell is transferred to a network comprising multiple switchingstages each being composed of basic switching modules. The switchingmodules of all stages are interconnected to form the network. Eachswitching module comprises a self-routing switch and buffers connectedthereto. The time stamp of cells arriving at a given one of the switchingmodules, where the cells are likely to arrive out of sequence, is constantlymonitored and a minimum value of the time stamps is detected. Whenan empty buffer exists in the given switching module, an idle cellcontaining the time stamp of the minimum value is generated at theoutput of the empty buffer.