Automated design of a minimum cost hybrid bus/star local area network

The authors developed a synthesis algorithm which is appropriate for use as a CAD tool in the design of a hybrid bus/star LAN. The algorithm is heuristic based, and systematically determines the layout of the physical components of the LAN. The user inputs the location of the desired stations and the CAD system determines the optimum LAN design. The locations of the network physical devices and the routing of the cable to interconnect the stations are determined subject to the constraints of commercially available hardware. The CAD system was used to design a LAN for four different cases of user input, which indicated that a cost figure ranging from 3.9% to 13% above an ideal lower bound was achieved