Overhead serial communication scheme

Details Overhead serial communication scheme Overhead serial communication scheme

1999-11-08

2003-12-16

Kizou, Hassan (Department: 2662)

Multiplex communications

Data flow congestion prevention or control

Control of data admission to the network

C710S055000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06665265

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to circuits for validation of overhead bytes generally and, more particularly, to a method and an architecture for serial communication between an overhead generator and an overhead processor for such validation.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Referring to
FIG. 1
, a conventional circuit
10
is shown comprising an overhead processor
12
, an overhead generator
14
and an overhead interface
16
. The overhead processor
12
may receive or generate a number of signals TOH (transport overhead), TOHEN (transmit overhead enable), TOHCLK (transmit overhead clock), TPOHFP (transmit path overhead frame pulse) and TTOHFP (transmit transport overhead frame pulse) for transferring overhead bytes from the overhead generator
14
to the overhead processor
12
. Generally, the signal TOH is the data for transmit, the signal TOHCLK is the clock for the overhead interface
16
, the signal TTOHFP is the start of the frame from the overhead processor
12
, and the signal TPOHFP is the payload indicator from the overhead processor
12
. The signal TOHEN is an indicator received from the path overhead generator
14
indicating whether the current path overhead bytes should be used or not.
FIG. 2
shows the waveform for communication typical of the approach described above with respect to FIG.
1
. As seen in
FIG. 2
, when the signal TOHEN is asserted on the first bit of the incoming overhead byte (i.e., TOH
1
, TOHEN), the overhead processor
12
recognizes the signal TOHEN as indicating that a valid overhead byte is to be used as the frame of a SONET device. When the signal TOHEN pin is de-asserted (i.e., TOH
2
) during the first bit of the overhead byte, the overhead processor
12
recognizes the overhead byte as not valid and uses the default value stored inside the overhead processor
12
.
As shown in the description above, this previous approach uses a separate pin to communicate the validation of the overhead byte.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention concerns a method of validating data between a path generator and a path processor, comprising the steps of (A) transmitting validation data from said path generator to said path processor on a data path, (B) sequentially transmitting data on said data path, (C) determining if the transmitted data is valid in response to the validation data and (D) using the overhead data by the processor when the overhead data is validated by the validation data.
Another aspect of the present invention concerns a circuit for validating overhead bytes comprising a data pin and a processor. The data pin may be configured to sequentially transmit one or more validation bits and an overhead data. The processor may be configured to determine if the transmitted overhead data is valid with respect to a previously sequentially transmitted validation data.
The objects, features and advantages of the present invention include a method and architecture that may provide (i) in-band signaling to communicate validation of overhead bytes, (ii) in-band communication in a serial communication scheme, and/or (iii) in-band communication without implementing a separate pin for such validation.


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Practical Data Communications, by Roger L. Freeman, 1995, pp. 433-448.

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