Broadband switching fabric in a communication controller

摘要

A method and apparatus for exchanging communication cells in a communication controller, wherein an arbiter determines transmission requests for each of a plurality of communication modules in the communication controller. Each communication module has a transmit signal line and a receive signal line coupled to a switching circuit in the communication controller. The arbiter selectively couples the transmit signal lines to the receive signal lines according to the transmission requests. The communication modules transmit communication cells through the switching circuit, while the arbiter determines new transmission requests from each communication module.