Active remote module for the attachment of user equipments to a communication processing unit

Claim 1

A circuit arrangement for attaching user devices to transmit communications medium and receive communications medium of a universal adapter which interfaces with at least one line adapter of a communications controller, said circuit arrangement comprising: a first means for receiving a transmit bit stream from the transmit communications medium and clock signals outputted from said line adapter, assembling the bit stream into a predetermined data format including a command field with bits representative of a command issued from said at least one line adapter, control field and a data field; a transmit interface means coupled to the first means; said transmit interface means arranging assembled bits into bit patterns specific to attached user devices; a receive interface means for accepting bits arranged in bit patterns specific from the attached user devices; a second means coupled to the receive interface means; said second means arranging the bits into the predetermined data format to be transmitted on the receive communications medium; an address register (214-0) located in said circuit arrangement for storing data representative of an address identifying a port of the universal adapter to which said user device is connected; a first storage means (242-0) located in said circuit arrangement for storing data representative of an interface type for attaching said user device to the port of the universal adapter; a second storage means (248-0) located in the circuit arrangement for storing data representative of a data rate for the attached user device; and means (260-0, 257) for selecting the data and appending it to the predetermined data format generated by the second means.