Abstract: A broadband communication system including an Internet Protocol Telephony Network and public switched telephone network, including apparatus and methods for placing a call on hold in a way that significantly reduces the amount of network bandwidth utilized by the call while the call is on hold. When a call is placed on hold, embodiments of the architecture of the telephony network of the present invention allows the network to essentially “forget” about the call placed on hold. In other words, a call that is on hold may require very little, or even zero, bandwidth within the telephony network. Accordingly, the total necessary bandwidth capacity of the telephony network may be smaller than it would be if calls on hold were to consume precious network bandwidth as is found in existing telephony systems.

Abstract: A system and method for providing automatic scheduling and establishment of telephone conferences over a network such as the Internet. A user inputs conference information to a desktop application, and the scheduling, the contacting of participants, and the control of the conference are conducted automatically. If the conference is scheduled to dial out to the participants and is marked as a calendar entry, the desktop application stores the conference information, including the start/end time of a conference, the telephone numbers of the participants, the choice of service provider, and an account id. Once a teleconference calendar entry is created, the process starts and the conference is established automatically. At the scheduled time, the desktop application warns the user by running an alarm function to remind them of the time of the conference.

Abstract: An apparatus having a pipeline having a series of stages. At least one of the pipeline stages has a first interface for coupling to a memory that stores output capacity information for a packet. The output capacity information is obtainable from the packet's packet header information or internal information where the internal information is used within a service provider's network. At least one of the pipeline stages has a second interface that receives packet size information; a third interface that receives the output capacity information; and comparison logic coupled to the second and third interfaces. A method that involves presenting packet header information and packet size information to one or more pipeline stages where the packet header information and the packet size information correspond to a packet. Then, determining within a stage associated with the pipeline, with the packet header information, output capacity for the packet.

Abstract: A transmission system encodes blocks of source data with error correction codes and spreads encoded data for each source block over a range of time and frequencies. This has the effect of reducing the impact of flat fading. This is because if a portion of the encoded data corresponding to a block of source data is lost, as a result of flat fading during a time interval, other portions, transmitted at a different time, may not be affected. A receiving system may therefore recover the original block of source data based on the portions of the encoded data that were received, including error correction bits. The transmission and receiving systems may be orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) communications systems.

Abstract: The combination of narrowband applications with broadband transport may be enabled with a communications architecture, in which one or more Media Gateways (MGs) that include broadband switching fabric are controlled by a Media Gateway Controller (MGC) that includes switching intelligence and narrowband switching fabric. A new data structure is provided in the MGC to identify bandwidth allocation on all traffic trunks interconnecting MGs controlled by the MGC. The new data structure can further maintain quality data representing the quality of packet transmissions in the broadband network data. The new data structure enables the MGC to monitor congestion in the broadband network and to allocate bandwidth more efficiently.

Abstract: A method of operating a packet network for carrying voice traffic, wherein the packets carrying voice traffic include voice samples. The method identifies a replacement packet opportunity, creates a replacement packet based on a selected packet, and inserts the replacement packet in the replacement packet opportunity. The replacement packet includes samples based on samples of the selected packet, but in an order that differs from the order of the samples in the selected packet. The method may further comprise identifying another replacement packet opportunity directly following the replacement packet opportunity, creating another replacement packet based on the replacement packet, and inserting the another replacement packet directly after the replacement packet. The another replacement packet differs from the replacement packet.

Abstract: A method for constructing a protocol stack of a data channel processor in a transmitter, in which the protocol stack includes: an application layer having a common management interface protocol (CMIP), a remote operation service element (ROSE), and an association control service element (ACSE); a presentation layer having an abstract syntax notion 1 (ASN.1) associated with a statement of an employed language; a session layer using an X.225 standard; a transport layer for data communication; a network layer conducting a routing; and the first to the eighteenth subnets for communicating data. Here, the first and the second subnets communicate the data with a system in the first and the second directions opposite each other, and the remainder subnets communicate the data with slave processors through a DPRAM.

Abstract: A method for establishing the location of access points for a network providing wireless communications coverage for an environment, including determining a coverage radius of an access point at certain locations within the environment, determining an average coverage radius of the access points for the environment based on the determined coverage radii, and positioning the access points at locations within the environment to provide continuous wireless coverage for the environment based on the average coverage radius.

Abstract: A method of avoiding the discarding of data in congested data networks includes receiving a data packet sent from a first station (15) to a first transceiver located in the data network. The data packet is designated to be forwarded to a second station (20) and the second station or a link, from a second transceiver to the second station, is temporarily busy. In this method the data packet is delayed by forwarding it from the first transceiver to a third transceiver (21) which is not busy and is forwarded back to the second station at a later time. Since it takes time to forward the data package through one or more other transceivers, the network operates to delay or store the data packet until the second station is no longer too busy.

Abstract: A digital subscriber line receiving apparatus having resilience to HAM radio interference noise and a method therefore includes an automatic gain controller for amplifying a received signal level to a signal level having a predetermined magnitude, a timing recoverer for recovering timing from a signal output from the automatic gain controller, an equalizer for removing interference noise from a signal received from the timing recoverer, a slicer for detecting a digital value from a signal received from the equalizer, an initialization controller for resetting the receiving apparatus and initializing the automatic gain controller, the timing recoverer, and the equalizer when the signal to noise ratio of the output signal of the equalizer is smaller than a reference signal to noise ratio, and an update controller for preventing automatic gain controller and equalizer from being initialized by the initialization controller when HAM radio interference noise is detected in the received signal.

Abstract: The invention relates to scheduling packets from numerous traffic classes that share a common high speed channel. A method and an apparatus for regulating several thousand traffic classes sharing a very high speed common channel of a capacity of the order of 80 Gb/s are described. The packets are generally of variable size, and each channel is assigned a transfer rate less than or equal to the capacity of shared channel, with the sum of transfer rates of all classes not exceeding the capacity of the shared channel. The rare allocation for each class is determined either by operator specification or, preferably, by automated means based on traffic monitoring. In the latter case, the transfer rate allocated to a class may be dynamically updated.

Abstract: A server installation, which includes multiple servers, services a client request using a filter index that is different than a destination address associated with the client request. This enables clients to generate client requests for a server installation in a conventional manner without regard to whether a server installation is formed by one server or multiple servers. Accordingly, when a server installation is scaled by increasing the number of servers for redundancy, load distribution or capacity reasons, reconfiguration of the clients utilizing the servers is unnecessary. In one arrangement, the data resides in a data structure having (i) a device identifier that uniquely identifies the server host among multiple server hosts, and (ii) a filter index which is different than the device identifier.

Abstract: A method and apparatus are disclosed for operating a network switch without the use of a CPU. A control interface is used to connect the network switch to the external CPU. The control interface generates an initialization signal indicative of the absence of a CPU. Upon receiving the initialization signal, an internal rules checker initializes the network switch. The internal rules checker will then begin receiving data frames and forwarding them to the appropriate network stations based on a source address and destination address contained in the data frames.

Abstract: The invention provides an apparatus and method that allows the operator of each user device participating in a multimedia conference to selectively receive information services during the multimedia conference. The apparatus includes a controller for receiving start-up signals from a user device, sending start-up requests to destination user devices, and receiving start-up signals from the destination user devices. The start-up signals may include information as to whether each user device requests information services to be provided during the multimedia conference. The controller establishes the multimedia conference and selectively provides the information services to the respective user devices. The information services are provided continuously or non-continuously at the preference of the user devices. The information services may also be provided in various formats at the preference of the user devices.

Abstract: A first orthogonal-multi-carrier signal is generated through N-point inverse discrete Fourier transform. The first orthogonal-multi-carrier signal has “N” or less orthogonal multiple carriers, where “N” denotes a predetermined natural number equal to or greater than 2. Every 1-unit time segment of the first orthogonal-multi-carrier signal is repeated “M” times to generate every 1-symbol time segment of a second orthogonal-multi-carrier signal. The second orthogonal-multi-carrier signal has a thinned set of “N” or less orthogonal multiple carriers spaced at M-carrier intervals, where “M” denotes a predetermined natural number equal to or greater than 2.