Communication system for a ring-type network

摘要

The invention provides a communication network system which permits parallel access of a plurality of nodes to a transmission line and which has a high throughput and low delay, with fairness among the nodes maintained. In the communication network system, a plurality of tokens correspondingly associated with the nodes, respectively, are allowed to circulate on the transmission line. Each node is allowed to transmit data only when the frame insertion buffer is empty. The node, when having data to be transmitted, awaits the arrival of a token. If a token that has arrived corresponds to the self node, or if a node corresponding to the arrived token is downstream of the destination node as viewed from the own self node, the node forms a packet from its holding data and transmits it onto the transmission line.