Joint flow control mechanism in a telecommunications network

摘要

A mechanism enabling plural queues (Qx-Qz) in a down stream telecommunications network element (12) to be treated as a single joint queue for purposes of connection-level flow control. A pointer in at least one queue descriptor points to a queue descriptor in which is maintained a set of shared, joint counters. Other flow control elements are maintained individually with respect to each queue descriptor. This mechanism enables flow control elements associated with a single transmitted queue (Qa) to flow control plural connections terminating in plural queues associated with a single processor (13).