The LANC-bringing local ATM to the workstation

The authors describe Lancaster University's experimental networked multimedia workstation. This workstation retains many of the ideas of the original multimedia network interface system and includes new features to enhance the performance of the workstation and communications. The authors consider that taking ATM to the devices places too great an overhead on the devices where a much simpler and more suitable interface can be used. ATM is too large for device interconnection in a workstation, but 32 bit mini-cells are an ideal size. The LANC is a simple switch which uses such mini cells for connecting a small number of devices and provides the devices with a simple interface which can perform data transfer with characteristics suited for multimedia. The ability to multicast to a number of devices on the LANC is implemented in a very simple and efficient wa