Connectionless switching by asynchronous Banyan networks
Achille Pattavina, C. Bison · 2002
Multistage networks built out of small switching elements with internal buffers, called asynchronous Banyan networks, are proposed in this paper to perform the switching function of variable-size packets in a connectionless network environment. These structures are suitable to be adopted both as the connectionless server of ATM switching nodes and as a switching node of a fully connectionless broadband network, such as a typical LAN/MAN environment. Asynchronous Banyan networks, which are provided with internal buffers in each switching element, exploit the packet self-routing technique by means of a self-routing tag attached to each packet. Thus, owing to such distributed processing capability, these networks are able to carry the loads typical of a broadband environment. Internal handshaking protocols are defined and different types of internal queueing strategies are studied for the Banyan networks.