MEDIA ACCESS CONTROL WITH ECHO BASED COLLISION DETECTION AND RESOLUTION

摘要

A novel and useful apparatus for and method of echo based collision detection and resolution used in controlling access to a shared media. The mechanism utilizes echoes generated by non-competing nodes to enable operation in the presence of hidden nodes. Mechanisms are provided for use by source and destination nodes to compete for the media. In addition, two mechanisms for handling the blocked node problem are provided. The first is a mechanism for initiating a link by a potential destination node, rather than the source node. The second is a mechanism whereby a node transmits a release indication signal to the media upon detecting that the media is available after being busy for a relatively long period of time. The invention also includes a mechanism for multi-priority level occupation of the media whereby a node may capture the media at different priority levels.