Abstract: A method and apparatus for packet alignment in a simulcast system includes a communications controller (310) having a vocoder and an input/output (I/O) processor (313) controlling the vocoder (311), the I/O processor having a timing alignment control (315) and a packet counter (314) for inserting timing alignment tags in voice/data packets and adjusting packet numbering and timing based on alignment requests from a master radio communication unit. The communications controller is coupled to radio communication units (330, 340, 350), each having a packet buffer (331) and an alignment processor (332) which includes a packet number detector (333) for detecting the transmission timing tag and sending a request for a packet numbering adjustment to the communications controller and a timing alignment detector (334) for comparing a receive time of the first information packet and a predetermined preferential receive time and for sending a timing alignment request to the communications controller.

Abstract: A digital communication network (10) with a multiple space storage, time space-time configuration defined by a first, or input, time stage (12), a second, or output, time stage (14) and a preselected number of space stages (16, 22, 24) interconnected between the time stages 12, 14) that introduce time delays which are compensated for by means for time shifting the data in a shadow memory (32) relative to data in a regular memory (34). On-line expansion is accomplished by operating the network (10) off of one of the regular memory and the shadow memory (32) during the expansion, introducing the amount of compensation required by the expansion and then shifting operation over to the other memory. The selection between memories (34, 32) is achieved by means of a trislatable device (38).