Abstract: A digital cellular telephone using a scalable channel coding scheme includes a memory arranged as a three-dimensional code book. The three-dimensional code book may receive the following three input variables: 1. The number of bit classes; 2. The number of bits per frame to be coded; and 3. The available size of the output codeword based on available channel capacity. For each of these input variables, the three-dimensional code book may output the following scalable coding parameters: 1. The number of bits per frame are partitioned into each of the coding classes; and 2. The puncture code per class. The invention provides the scalable coding parameters in real-time. It does this, however, without calculating the parameters in real-time. The memory may be arranged in the following manner. A number of information bits to be coded is determined by a mode of the transmission signal.