Packet data transmission with asynchronous bandwidth switching

摘要

The bandwidth of a packet data transmission node is switched asynchronously without interruption of data transmission and with a minimum of circuit complexity. In particular, a packet channel is permitted to "breathe", gaining bandwidth when additional bandwidth becomes available from other temporarily unused digital channels and losing such additional bandwidth when such unused digital channels revert to other use. To permit such uninterrupted asynchronous operation, a "pad" or "throw away" character is defined which is ignored or discarded when it is received by another packet network node. Such a "pad" or "throwaway" character is unique only in the sense that it is distinct from and may not be confused with characters or bytes which may occur in normal data transmission sequences.