Combined telephone pbx and computer data router with pooled resources

Abstract

System resources are pooled and allocated in an optimal manner to handling telephone voice traffic or to handling computer data traffic. A combination of mechanisms is used to achieve higher statistical multiplexing on a network interface by dynamically adjusting the multiplexing. The system: 1) Provides homogeneous access to DS0 trunk resource by both voice and data traffic, resulting in a larger resource pool. 2) Partially normalizes the class of service characteristics of data traffic to make it more predictable and can dynamically adjust the bandwidth such that requests for resources can be honored with a higher success rate, and 3) Maintains multiple qualities of service for multiple voice and data streams drawing from a single resource pool. Data traffic is normalized into flows, each of which has an assigned priority and bandwidth is allocation to each of the flows.

Description

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS [0001] This application is a division of co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 09 / 527,968, filed Mar. 17, 2000 which claimed priority from U.S. provisional application Ser. No. 60 / 125,347, filed Mar. 19, 1999, all of which are hereby incorporated by reference.FIELD OF THE INVENTION [0002] The present invention relates to communication systems and more particularly to PBXs (private branch exchanges) for telephone circuits and to LANs (local area networks) and WANs (wide area networks) for data transmission. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0003] Most present day offices include telephones and computers. Office suites generally have a PBX or key system to handle the telephones and a separate Data Router to interconnect computers via a LAN. [0004] Telephone key systems and PBX systems are available in a wide variety of forms. Most such systems are built using special purpose hardware. However, recently, programmed personal computers have been used to ...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0010] The present invention also provides a modular system that can be expanded easily and which can meet the needs of a variety of office environments. The present invention utilizes a combination of mechanisms to achieve higher statistical multiplexing on a network interface by dynamically adjusting the multiplexing. The present invention:

[0011] 1) Provides homogeneous access to DS0 trunk resource by both voice and data traffic, resulting in a larger resource pool.

[0012] 2) Partially normalizes the class of service characteristics of data traffic to make it more predictable and can dynamically adjust the bandwidth such that requests for resources can be honored with a higher success rate, and

[0016] The present invention achieves higher statistical multiplexing achieved by;

Problems solved by technology

However, such methods have been limited by several obstacles.

Among the obstacles is the fact that the mechanisms used to determine the maximum multiplexing rate have been limited by a common class of service for all sources and destination.

Another obstacle is the fact that only true telephony traffic, that is voice calls, are applied to the multiplexing function.

Still another obstacle has been the fact that there is no ability to adapt the multiplexing rate dynamically as a function of load by class of service.

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