A TDM bus is one application of the principle of time-division multiplexing

Time-division multiplexing

Time-division multiplexing is a type of digital multiplexing in which two or more bit streams or signals are transferred apparently simultaneously as sub-channels in one communication channel, but are physically taking turns on the channel. The time domain is divided into several recurrent...

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In a TDM Bus, data or information arriving from an input line is put onto specific timeslots on a high-speed bus

Bus

A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...

, where a recipient would listen to the bus and pick out only the signals for a certain timeslot.

It resembles the TDM carried out in synchronous optical networking

Synchronous optical networking

Synchronous Optical Networking and Synchronous Digital Hierarchy are standardized multiplexing protocols that transfer multiple digital bit streams over optical fiber using lasers or highly coherent light from light-emitting diodes . At low transmission rates data can also be transferred via an...

, but the "TDM Bus" term is more commonly used when the bus is inside a single unit like a telecommunications switch or a PC.

A specification for putting a TDM bus on PCI

Peripheral Component Interconnect

Conventional PCI is a computer bus for attaching hardware devices in a computer...

 hardware has been published as H.100/H.110 by the Enterprise Computer Telephony Forum (ECTF). These are not related to the ITU-T

ITU-T

The ITU Telecommunication Standardization Sector is one of the three sectors of the International Telecommunication Union ; it coordinates standards for telecommunications....

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