A method of facilitating the scheduling of a first
multicast request
signal of a series of
multicast request signals is disclosed, wherein the first request
signal is generated to enable the transmission of a
multicast data
cell by a source port processor to at least one destination port processor. In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the first request
signal is received by a roster storage
chip associated with a scheduler subsystem. The first request signal has associated therewith a multicast
label of a first value and is adapted to schedule transmission of the first multicast
cell to the at least one destination port processor at a first time. A roster of the at least one destination port processor to which the first multicast
cell is destined is then generated. A dependence distance associated with the first request signal is determined. The dependence distance comprises the numerical value of the difference between a current multicast
cell number (CMCN) and a previous multicast
cell number (PMCN). The roster and the dependence distance are transmitted to one of the at least one scheduler chips, such transmission causing the roster and the dependence distance to occupy a second
tail entry slot of a second
circular buffer associated with the one of the at least one scheduler chips. The second
tail entry slot has associated therewith a first multicast table index (MTI) comprising a numerical value. The scheduler
chip further has associated therewith a head entry slot having associated therewith a second MTI comprising a numerical value. A first numerical parameter comprising the numerical sum of the dependence distance and the first MTI is determined. If the first numerical parameter is higher in value than the second MTI, the first request signal is arbitrated.