GLOSSARY

Cell Header - ATM Layer protocol control information.

Cell Transfer Delay - the transit delay of an ATM cell successfully passed between two designated boundaries.

CLP (Cell Loss Priority) - the last bit of byte four in an ATM cell header; indi- cates the eligibility of the cell for discard by the network under congested conditions. If the bit is set to 1, the cell may be discarded by the network depending on traffic conditions.

Concentrator - a communications device that offers the ability to concentrate many lower-speed channels into and out of one or more high-speed channels.

Connection - the concatenation of ATM Layer links in order to provide an end-to-end information transfer capability to access points.

Connectionless Service - a type of service in which no pre-determined path or link has been established for transfer of information, supported by AAL 4.

Connection-Oriented Service - a type of service in which information always traverses the same pre-established path or link between two points, sup- ported by AAL 3.

Corresponding Entities - peer entities with a lower layer connection among them.

cpath - a FORE program used to manage virtual paths on a FORE Systems ATM switch running asxd.

cport - a FORE program used to monitor and change the state of ports on a FORE Systems ATM switch running asxd.

CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check) - an error detection scheme in which a number is derived from the data that will be transmitted. By recalculating the CRC at the remote end and comparing it to the value originally transmitted, the receiving node can detect errors.

CS (Convergence Sublayer) - a portion of the AAL. Data is passed first to the CS where it is divided into rational, fixed-length packets or PDUs (Protocol Data Units). For example, AAL 4 processes user data into blocks that are a maximum of 64 kbytes long.

DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) - the US govern- ment agency that funded the ARPANET.

DCS (Digital Cross-connect System) - an electronic patch panel used to route digital signals in a central office.

Demultiplexing - a function performed by a layer entity that identifies and separates SDUs from a single connection to more than one connection. (See multiplexing.)

g-5

Page 163
Image 163
Cabletron Systems 9A000 manual Glossary