초록 ▼

A data multiplexing network is described which multiplexes a plurality of asynchronous data channels with an asynchronous data stream representing compressed voice signals and/or facsimile signals onto a single synchronous data packet stream. The single synchronous data packet stream is then transmi

A data multiplexing network is described which multiplexes a plurality of asynchronous data channels with an asynchronous data stream representing compressed voice signals and/or facsimile signals onto a single synchronous data packet stream. The single synchronous data packet stream is then transmitted by a high speed statistical multiplexer over a composite link to a second site using a modified high-level synchronous data link control protocol with an overlay of an advanced priority statistical multiplexing algorithm. The asynchronous data channels and the compressed voice channel and/or facsimile signals are demultiplexed and reconstructed for sending to other asynchronous computer terminals and to a standard telephone or facsimile analog port at the second site, respectively. PBX trunk interfaces are also provided to allow PBX's to share the composite link between sites. Communication between the first site by voice or facsimile and the second site is transparent to the users. The multiplexer efficiently allocated the bandwidth of the composite link by detecting silence periods in the voice signals and suppressing the sending of the voice information to preserve bandwidth. An advanced priority statistical multiplexer is also described which dynamically allocates composite link bandwidth to both time-sensitive and non-time-sensitive data to maximize data throughout efficiency and quality while simultaneously reducing multiplexer processing overhead.

대표청구항 ▼

[ What is claimed is:] [1.]1. A method for transmitting information, comprising the steps of:if there is pending high priority data and pending low priority data to be transferred, then sending a hybrid frame by the steps including:(1) transmitting the pending high priority data;(2) transmitting up

[ What is claimed is:] [1.]1. A method for transmitting information, comprising the steps of:if there is pending high priority data and pending low priority data to be transferred, then sending a hybrid frame by the steps including:(1) transmitting the pending high priority data;(2) transmitting up to K bytes of the pending low priority data, K not to exceed an interrupt boundary byte count, wherein the interrupt boundary byte count is equal to a number of bytes transferable in a high priority packet time minus a maximum number of high priority bytes generated per the high priority packet time, and wherein the high priority packet time is an interval of time between a generation of a plurality of high priority bytes; and(3) transmitting further high priority data and low priority data by the steps including:(i) if there is high priority data to be transferred, transmitting the high priority data, the high priority data preceded by a high priority data identifier; and(ii) if there is low priority data to be transferred, transmitting up to K bytes of low priority data.