Abstract: An improved arbitration technique for a computer network system in which multiple nodes communicate using a shared bus, and at least one node has no knowledge of the current status of the arbitration taking place between all nodes in the system. Such a node is called a "deaf node". Each node in the system is assigned an initial arbitration count number, for example, N+1, where N is the node number assigned to the node. The arbitration count number is the number of quiet slots a node must count before trying to transmit on the system bus. The length of a quiet slot is determined by a particular system's electrical characteristics. One quiet slot is reserved as the "deaf node quiet slot", during which a deaf node may transmit. In response to a transmission occurring in the deaf node quiet slot, each node in the system reinitializes its arbitration count number to its initial arbitration count number.

Abstract: An improved arbitration technique for a computer network system in which multiple nodes communicate using a shared bus. Each node in the system is assigned an initial arbitration number, N+1, where N is the node number assigned to the node. The arbitration number is the number of quiet slots a node must count before trying to transmit on the system bus. The length of a quiet slot is determined by a particular system's electrical characteristics. Each node in the system monitors a carrier signal on the system bus, the presence of which indicates that a node is transmitting on the bus. Upon detecting the absence of the carrier signal, each node in the system begins to count quiet slots. Every time a node counts an additional quiet slot, it checks to see if the count matches its arbitration number. If the two values are equal, the node checks to see if it has a transmit request, and begins to transmit a message on the system bus if a transmit request is present.