Primary station for use in a multiple access telecommunication network

摘要

In a multiple access transmission system it can be desired to have the possibility to change the type of access protocol in response to the traffic demand of subscriber stations in order to prevent deterioration of the transmission efficiency. In order to do so, the primary station (2) transmits to the secondary stations (2, ...12) a channel indicator, indicating where in the uplink frame the secondary station can submit its access requests. In a preferred embodiment, the primary station submits also the message the secondary station has to use when submitting an access request. Applications of the invention include multimedia networks using CATV systems.