HIGH PERFORMANCE WIRELESS NETWORKS USING DISTRIBUTED CONTROL AND SWITCH-STACK PARADIGM

1 . A method of routing voice and data traffic within a hierarchical node-based mesh network comprising:

storing data as individual data packets;

including in each data packet a destination node of the data packet;

sending the data from the data packet's source node to the source node's parent node;

processing the data by the parent node;

identifying the destination node of the data;

sending the data from the parent node toward the destination node.

2 . The method of routing data of claim 1 further comprising selecting the destination node on the basis of the destination information contained in the data packet.

3 . The method of routing data of claim 2 wherein the destination is selected by said parent node to be a destination child node if the destination information identifies the destination child node or if the destination information identifies the destination as a descendant of said child node; wherein the destination is selected to be the parent node if the destination information identifies the parent node; and wherein the destination is selected to be the parent node's parent otherwise.

4 . The method of routing data of claim 3 further comprising sending data from the parent node to its parent node on a first wireless frequency and a first wireless radio.

5 . The method of routing data of claim 4 further comprising sending data from the parent node to its child node on a second wireless frequency and a second wireless radio.

6 . The method of routing data of claim 1 further comprising a node communicating with one or more client devices in wireless communication with the node.

7 . The method of routing data of claim 1 wherein each node maintains a counter of child nodes in communication with the node; and the node maintains an identification of its parent node.

8 . The method of routing data of claim 7 wherein a subset of nodes further comprise a connection to an external network.

9 . The method of routing data of claim 8 wherein the external network comprises an Ethernet link.

10 . A method of routing voice and data traffic within a hierarchical node-based mesh network comprising:

storing data as individual data packets;

including in each data packet a destination node of the data packet;

receiving a data packet at a network node, wherein each network node has only one parent node, and said packet originates at said single parent of said network node;

determining if the packet destination is the network node itself or a descendant of the network node;

if the destination is the network node itself, processing the packet by said node;

if the destination is a child of said network node, sending the packet to the child node for processing by said child node; and

if the destination is a descendant of a child node of said network node, sending the packet to the child node that has the destination node as its descendant.

11 . A method of routing voice and data traffic within a hierarchical node-based mesh network wherein each node has only one parent node, comprising:

storing data as individual data packets;

including in each data packet a destination node of the data packet;

receiving at a node a packet from a child node of said node;

determining if the packet destination is the node itself or a descendant of the node;

if the destination is the node itself, processing the packet by said node;

if the destination is a descendant of said node, sending the packet to the child node that is either the destination or has the destination node as its descendant; and

if the destination node is neither the node itself nor a descendant of said node, sending the packet to the parent of said node.