wormhole routing

messaging A property of a message passing system in which

each part of a message is transmitted independently and one

part can be forwarded to the next node before the whole

message has been received. All parts of a single message

follow the same route.

The independent parts are normally small, e.g. one 32-bit

word. This reduces the latency and the storage requirements

on each node when compared with message switching where a

node receives the whole message before it starts to forward it

to the next node. It is more complex than message switching

because each node must keep track of the messages currently

flowing through it.

With cut-through switching, wormhole routing is applied to

packets in a packet switching system so that forwarding of

a packet starts as soon as its destination is known, before

the whole packet had arrived.

(2003-05-15)