Abstract: Routing connections evenly through each plane of a multi-plane switch can reduce crosstalk in a switch. The routing of the connections can be parallelized in order to provide high speed routing of the connections.

Abstract: Systems and methods for scheduling data for transmission over photonic switches are described herein. In one embodiment, an apparatus is provided that includes a node having M photonic interfaces. The node is configured to transmit a message having R requests. Each one of the R requests is a request to transmit data from the node to another node. R may be greater than M. Additionally or alternatively, each request may include a queue index corresponding to a respective queue in the node. The value of the queue index may be based on both a queue occupancy of the respective queue and a delay parameter.

Abstract: Method and apparatus are provided for controlling an interface to a switch, for example a photonic switch. The method comprises communicatively connecting a controller to a source node and to a destination node; receiving from the source node information indicating a status of at least one input queue at the source node; allocating, based on the information, the at least one input queue to at least one interface of the source node; and aligning frames at the destination node when multiple interfaces of the source node are used for transmission of one input queue. Transmission of one input queue is coordinated via multiple interfaces of the source node. An ingress/egress chip for providing an ingress/egress interface to a photonic switch is also provided.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for routing received connection demands through a photonic switch having multiple parallel instances of a switching plane is provided. Routing respects the constraint that each cell of the switch accommodates a maximum of one lightpath. Connection demands are routed one at a time via switching plane instances where it is possible without violating the constraint. When a demand cannot be routed, a re-arrangement step is performed. A previously routed demand that conflicts with the blocked demand is identified and de-allocated. The blocked demand is then routed in place of this de-allocated demand, which is now considered blocked. The process repeats until no blocked demands remain. Attempts to route additional demands of lower priority can also be made by checking whether each lower priority demand can be routed given the configuration of the switch to route existing demands.

Abstract: Systems and methods for scheduling data for transmission over photonic switches are described herein. In one embodiment, an apparatus is provided that includes a node having M photonic interfaces. The node is configured to transmit a message having R requests. Each one of the R requests is a request to transmit data from the node to another node. R may be greater than M. Additionally or alternatively, each request may include a queue index corresponding to a respective queue in the node. The value of the queue index may be based on both a queue occupancy of the respective queue and a delay parameter.