Patent · US Expired

Method for automatically classifying traffic with enhanced hierarchy in a packet communications network

US6591299B2 · kind B2 · utility

107Cited by
18References
17Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateMay 24, 2002
Grant dateJul 8, 2003
Priority date
Expiry dateMay 24, 2022

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04L69/18
  • WIPO fieldDigital communication
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

In packet communication, a method for automatically classifying packet flows for use in allocating bandwidth resources and the like by a rule of assignment of a service level. By rendering discoverable the attributes of a flow specification for packet flows, a finer grained hierarchy of classification is provided automatically that is based on information which is specific to the type of program or application supported by the flow and thus allowing greater flexibility in control over different flows within the same application. The method comprises applying individual instances of traffic classification paradigms to packet network flows based on selectable information obtained from a plurality of layers to define a characteristic class, then mapping the flow to the defined traffic class. The flow specification is provided with some application-specific attributes, some of which are discoverable. The discoverable attributes lead to an ability to automatically create sub-nodes of nodes for finer-grained control.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.