The Express Broadcast Network: a network for low-latency broadcast of control messages

We present the Express Broadcast Network (EBN), a network used for quick and reliable broadcast of control messages in multicomputer networks. The EBN can be implemented with a single extra wire per network link and with minimal extra hardware at each routing node. However, it provides very fast broadcast mechanisms that take advantage of all redundancy in the network to deliver messages regardless of faulty network components. We present extensions of the basic network to include multiple-wire, multiple-bit, and bidirectional wire support, as well as describing basic methods of using the EBN for various applications.<>