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Everything about Asynchronous Transfer Mode

Digital telecommunications protocol for voice, video, and data

Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) is a telecommunications standard defined by the American National Standards Institute and International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector for digital transmission of multiple types of traffic. ATM was developed to meet the needs of the Broadband Integrated Services Digital Network as defined in the late 1980s, and designed to integrate telecommunication networks. It can handle both traditional high-throughput data traffic and real-time, low-latency content such as telephony (voice) and video. ATM is a cell switching technology, providing functionality that combines features of circuit switching and packet switching networks by using asynchronous time-division multiplexing. ATM was seen in the 1990s as a competitor to Ethernet and networks carrying IP traffic, as it was faster and, unlike Ethernet, designed with quality-of-service in mind, but it fell out of favor once Ethernet reached speeds of 1 gigabit per second. Wikipedia →

🧭 Start here: a 6-step reading path

  1. Read the overview: Asynchronous Transfer ModeA 5-minute orientation
  2. Skim a recent paper: Application of ATM Asynchronous Transfer Mode Intellectualization in Civil Aviation SystemInfluential work since 2022
  3. Pick up a classic book: ATMThe most-reprinted book on the subject
  4. Read the landmark paper: Broadband ISDN and asynchronous transfer mode (ATM)Cited 224 times
  5. Go sideways: ATM adaptation layerA closely related topic
  6. Go sideways: ATM Adaptation Layer 5A closely related topic

📖 Definitions

Noun A broadband voice and data technology with quality (class) of service QoS transmission for sending and receiving voice, data, and multimedia information over a fiber-optic network.

🗂️ The subject at a glance

  1. Protocol architecture
  2. Virtual circuits
  3. Traffic engineering
  4. Reference model
  5. Deployment
  6. Wireless or mobile ATM

🏆 Landmark papers (most cited)

🆕 Influential since 2022

📚 Books worth reading

Ranked by number of editions on Open Library, a rough measure of how lasting a book is.

🔗 Related topics