Abstract: A temporary multimedia ELAN is formed on top of one or more existing ELANs between those end-stations (121-1, 121-2, 111-1) participating in a multimedia session, such as a video conference, at the time of initiating the session. At the end of the session the temporary ELAN is torn down. When the temporary ELAN is created an available LAN Emulation Server (LES) (241) and an available Broadcast and Unknown Server (BUS) (243) are allocated to serve those end-stations participating in the multimedia session. The BUS also serves as a multicast server to multicast a multimedia stream from one end-station to each other end-station on the temporary ELAN. The initiator of a session accesses a Multimedia Session Manager (401), which oversees and manages the session and coordinates the necessary resources.

Abstract: Multiple LAN emulation servers (LESs) and broadcast and unknown servers (BUSs) are employed to serve a single emulated LAN (ELAN). The LAN emulation clients (LECs) are assigned to sub-ELANs, each of which includes several LECs of the ELAN, e.g., those that are geographically close. Each such sub-ELAN includes its own LES and BUS. The LESs and BUSs of the sub-ELANs are connected so that the sub-ELANs form a single ELAN. The LESs/BUSs can be interconnected in any pattern that allows each LES/BUS to communicate with each other LES/BUS via at least one path, which need not be direct. The LES and BUS of each sub-ELAN presents themselves as proxy-LECs of the other sub-ELANs to which they are connected. The ELAN can include a LAN Emulation Configuration Server (LECS) for downloading the connection topology and forwarding rules to all the sub-ELANs. The topology and rules are downloaded each time the ELAN is configured, e.g.

Abstract: Communication, for example, via the internet protocol (IP), is facilitated among ATM-attached, LAN-attached and telephone-network-attached hosts, by a so-called "RouTel" and an address server. The RouTel provides gateway capabilities for connecting a) the telephone network, e.g., via 1) integrated services digital network basic rate interface (ISDN BRI), 2) ISDN primary rate interface (ISDN PRI), or 3) modem interfaces, and b) an ATM network, via one or more ATM interfaces. Optionally, the RouTel provides interfaces for directly attaching legacy LANs, e.g., Ethernet, FDDI, and Token Ring. More particularly, the RouTel can perform IP packet forwarding between 1) a telephone-network-attached host and an ATM-attached host; 2) two telephone-network-attached hosts; and 3) a telephone-network-attached host and a legacy LAN-attached host.

Abstract: A name mapper, name servers, and multimedia servers are connected to a multimedia manager. Each client has the name of a multimedia server, i.e., a virtual host name, from which it can obtain multimedia service. The name server stores associations of server host names to layer-3 addresses. When a client initiates a multimedia session, it requests the layer-3 address of the server that corresponds to its server's name. The name server sends the layer-3 address of the one of the multimedia servers that is currently designated as corresponding to that name. The multimedia client stores the name-to-layer-3 address binding in it's cache. The multimedia client then establishes communications with the multimedia server at that layer-3 address and clears its cache. The dynamic name-to-layer-3 address binding in the name server is managed by the name mapper, which may be collocated with the multimedia manager or may be located on a separate server.

Abstract: A so-called "ELAN contronect network" is employed to interconnect sub-ELANs to form an ELAN. More specifically, the "ELAN contronect network" is a separate network for interconnecting the servers of the sub-ELANs, where a sub-ELAN is a part of an ELAN having its own LES and BUS that may also be configured as a stand-alone ELAN. Each of the sub-ELANs is connected to the ELAN contronect network via a point-to-point connection-oriented connection, e.g., an asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) connection and the ELAN contronect network is configured to present itself to each of the servers of the sub-ELANs as clients thereof. In a particular embodiment of the invention, the ELAN contronect network includes an address server, a broadcast/route server, a configuration server, multimedia servers, and at least one LAN hub interconnected over a high-speed backbone.

Abstract: A pool of multimedia servers, which may be geographically diverse, are available to be allocated to serve one of at least two ELANs served by an ELAN contronect network. These multimedia servers are a) connected to, b) dynamically allocated to sub-ELANs, and c) managed by, a multimedia server manager, which is included as part of the ELAN contronect network. In particular, each of the multimedia servers is capable of having its addresses dynamically reconfigured in response to commands from the multimedia server manager to match that of an ELAN to which it is being made available, so that the multimedia server becomes a part of that ELAN. The multimedia server manager obtains a layer-3 address from address server 427 of the ELAN contronect network which it then assigns to the multimedia server so that the multimedia server appears to be a part of the ELAN to which it is assigned to serve.