High speed linking module

Claim 3

The device of claim 1 including an optical transmitter for transmitting the serial data stream onto the fiber optic data line.

Claim 4

The device of claim 1 wherein the data from each of the respective input data lines is 9 bits wide and an output frame in the serial data stream is 24 bits long.

Claim 5

The device of claim 3 wherein a parity generator is coupled between the first multiplexer and the serializing transmitter for adding a parity bit to one of the respective input data lines.

Claim 8

The device of claim 5 wherein the receiver includes an optical receiver for receiving the serial input data stream from the fiber optic data line.

Claim 9

The device of claim 5 wherein the data from each of the respective output data lines is 9 bits wide and an input frame in the serial input data stream is 24 bits long.

Claim 10

In channel-to-channel communications among devices, wherein each device has a plurality of ports for connecting to communication links between the devices, a method for communicating between two devices over a single link comprising the steps of: (a) converting a plurality of data streams from respective ports of a first of the two devices into one serial data stream, including the steps of: (i) multiplexing at least two of the plurality of data streams into a first intermediate output stream; (ii) multiplexing at least two other of the plurality of data streams into a second intermediate output stream; (iii) serializing the first and second intermediate output streams into the serial data stream, (iv) synchronizing the serialization of the first and second intermediate output streams, (v) tagging output data in the serial data stream as corresponding to data from each of the respective ports of the first device, including providing a signal having a cycle with a first phase and a second phase, and tagging two of the respective ports with the first phase and tagging two other respective ports with the second phase, and (vi) transmitting the serial data stream on the single link to a second of the two devices; (b) converting the serial data stream in the second device to at least four input data streams, and (c) sending each of the input data streams to a port of the second device.

Claim 11

In channel-to-channel communications among devices, wherein each device has a plurality of ports for connecting to communication links between the devices, a method for communicating between two devices over a single link comprising the steps of: (a) converting a plurality of data streams from respective ports of a first of the two devices into one serial data stream, including the steps of: (i) multiplexing at least two of the plurality of data streams into a first intermediate output stream; (ii) multiplexing at least two other of the plurality of data streams into a second intermediate output stream; (iii) serializing the first and second intermediate output streams into the serial data stream, (iv) synchronizing the serialization of the first and second intermediate output streams, (v) tagging output data in the serial data stream as corresponding to data from each of the respective ports of the first device, including providing a signal having a cycle with a first phase and a second phase, and tagging two of the respective ports with the first phase and tagging two other respective ports with the second phase, and (vi) transmitting the serial data stream on the single link to a second of the two devices; (b) converting the serial data stream in the second device to at least four input data streams, and (c) sending each of the input data streams to a port of the second device.

Claim 12

The method of claim 8 wherein step (b) includes the steps of: (i) de-serializing the serial data stream into first and second intermediate parallel data streams, (ii) demultiplexing the first intermediate parallel data stream into two parallel data streams on two respective data lines; (iii) demultiplexing the second intermediate parallel data stream into two other parallel data streams on two other respective data lines; (iv) synchronizing the de-serialization of the first and second intermediate output streams and (v) separating data in the serial data stream to data for each of the respective data lines.

Claim 13

The method of claim 8 wherein the single link is a fiber optic link.

Claim 14

In channel-to-channel communications among devices, wherein each device has a plurality of ports for connecting to communication links between the devices, a method for communicating between two devices over a single link comprising the steps of: (a) converting a plurality of data streams from respective ports of a first of the two devices into one serial data stream; (b) transmitting the serial data stream on the single link to a second of the two devices; (c) converting the serial data stream in the second device to at least four input data streams, (d) sending each of the input data streams to a port of the second device, (e) transferring the plurality of data streams between the first and second devices, and (f) checking status between the first and second devices free of disrupting the transfer of the plurality of data streams.

Claim 15

In channel-to-channel communications among devices, wherein each device has a plurality of ports for connecting to communication links between the devices, a method for communicating between two devices over a single link comprising the steps of: (a) converting a plurality of data streams from respective ports of a first of the two devices into one serial data stream; (b) transmitting the serial data stream on the single link to a second of the two devices; (c) converting the serial data stream in the second device to at least four input data streams, (d) sending each of the input data streams to a port of the second device, (e) transferring the plurality of data streams between the first and second devices, and (f) checking status between the first and second devices free of disrupting the transfer of the plurality of data streams.

Claim 16

In an Enterprise Systems Connection (ESCON) architecture having channel directors, each channel director including (a) input and output data ports for receiving and transmitting data streams and (b) a switch matrix for dynamically connecting the data ports, wherein a first channel director communicates with a second channel director over a fiber optic data line, a device for the first channel director comprising: at least four input ports, each port receiving one of the data streams, a multiplexer for converting the data streams from the four input ports into an intermediate data stream, a transmitter for serializing the intermediate data stream into a serial data stream for output onto the fiber optic data line, and a signal for tagging output data in the serial data stream as corresponding to data from each of the respective input ports wherein the signal includes a cycle having a first phase and a second phase, the first phase for tagging output data in the serial data stream from two ports of the respective input ports and the second phase for tagging output data in the serial data stream from two other ports of the respective input ports.

Claim 17

In an Enterprise Systems Connection (ESCON) architecture having channel directors, each channel director including (a) input and output data ports for receiving and transmitting data streams and (b) a switch matrix for dynamically connecting the data ports, wherein a first channel director communicates with a second channel director over a fiber optic data line, a device for the first channel director comprising: at least four input ports, each port receiving one of the data streams, a multiplexer for converting the data streams from the four input ports into an intermediate data stream, a transmitter for serializing the intermediate data stream into a serial data stream for output onto the fiber optic data line, and a signal for tagging output data in the serial data stream as corresponding to data from each of the respective input ports wherein the signal includes a cycle having a first phase and a second phase, the first phase for tagging output data in the serial data stream from two ports of the respective input ports and the second phase for tagging output data in the serial data stream from two other ports of the respective input ports.

Claim 18

The ESCON architecture of claim 12 further including a second device for the second channel director, the second device comprising a receiver for receiving the serial data stream from the fiber optic data line, a demultiplexer for demultiplexing the serial data stream into four parallel data streams, and an identifier for identifying each of the four parallel data streams as belonging to one of the four ports from the first channel director.