Abstract: A mechanism enabling plural queues in a downstream telecommunications network element to be treated as a single, joint queue for purposes of connection-level flow control. A pointer in at least one queue descriptor points to a queue descriptor in which is maintained a set of shared, joint counters. Other flow control elements are maintained individually with respect to each queue descriptor. This mechanism enables flow control elements associated with a single transmitter queue to flow control plural connections terminating in plural queues associated with a single receiver processor.

Abstract: A mechanism enabling plural queues in a downstream telecommunications network element to be treated as a single, joint queue for purposes of connection-level flow control. A pointer in at least one queue descriptor points to a queue descriptor in which is maintained a set of shared, joint counters. Other flow control elements are maintained individually with respect to each queue descriptor. This mechanism enables flow control elements associated with a single transmitter queue to flow control plural connections terminating in plural queues associated with a single receiver processor.

Abstract: A network switch utilizing centralized and partitioned memory for storing connection topology information. The switch includes at least one input port, at least one output port and a central switch fabric interconnecting the input port and output port, with the connection topology memory centralized at the switch fabric. The central switch fabric includes at least one input side translator associated with a predetermined number of input ports and at least one output side translator associated with a predetermined number of output ports. The connection topology memory is distributed among the at least one input side translator and the at least one output side translator. With this arrangement, memory bandwidth requirements associated with connection topology look-up operations are distributed and scaling the number of ports is facilitated.