A General Class of Rate-Change Circuits

Algebraic coding schemes1 increase the length of the information block. Shortened codes2'3 obtained from such coding schemes further alter the length. When these codes are transmitted uniformly over the telephone networks, a change of rate from the received rate to the transmitted rate is essential. Further, channels carry coded information at different rates. If it is necessary to obtain information at a uniform rate, encode it with a general coding scheme and transmit it over any general channel, decode it to its original rate and refurnish it, then many stages of rate changing are necessary. To collate bursts of information from many sources onto a signal channel also entails a rate-change process. Distributing circuits which select and uniformly distribute a given number of information bits from longer blocks of uniformly received information are special cases of rate-change circuits. It is the object of this paper to report a set of circuits which perform (i) general rate changing, (ii) general collating and sorting, and finally (Hi) reversing and re versing-wit h-rate-changing 3177