Abstract: A method and system for transmitting a loopback cell within an ATM connection. The method comprises the steps of detecting in an input adapter whether or not an incoming ATM cell includes a loopback condition indicator. If so, specific routing labels are appended to the incoming ATM cell indicating that the incoming cell is a loopback cell to be looped back on the connection such that the switch engine of the switching node transfers the loopback cell to the same port of the input adapter utilizing the appended routing labels.

Abstract: A system and method for merging multiple connections that share a same class of service into a single virtual circuit (VC) in an Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) network. A queuing apparatus includes multiple connection queues for each of the connections, and further includes a scheduled queue corresponding to a particular class of service, wherein contents of the connection queues are transferred into the scheduled queue before being transmitted on the VC. A reassembly queue control block (RQCB) defines a chain of buffer control blocks for the connection queues. Each buffer control block corresponds to a cell belonging to a packet of a particular connection and includes a next buffer address and a lock bit. The chain of buffer control blocks is transferred to a scheduled queue control block (SQCB) in response the lock bit indicating a last packet cell.

Abstract: A method and system for transmitting a loopback cell within an ATM connection. The method comprises the steps of detecting in an input adapter whether or not an incoming ATM cell includes a loopback condition indicator. If so, specific routing labels are appended to the incoming ATM cell indicating that the incoming cell is a loopback cell to be looped back on the connection such that the switch engine of the switching node transfers the loopback cell to the same port of the input adapter utilizing the appended routing labels.

Abstract: A system and method for merging multiple connections that share a same class of service into a single virtual circuit (VC) connecting a first switching node to a second switching node in an Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) network. In accordance with the system of the present invention, a data buffer stores cells that constitute a packet received by a switching node. A queuing apparatus includes multiple connection queues associated respectively with each of the connections, and further includes a scheduled queue corresponding to a particular class of service, wherein contents of the connection queues are transferred into the scheduled queue before being transmitted on the VC. A reassembly queue control block (RQCB) is associated with each of the connection queues, and defines a chain of buffer control blocks. Each buffer control block corresponds to a cell belonging to a packet transmitted in a particular connection.