Patent ID: 9602392
Date: 2017-03-21
CPC Classifications: H04L

Claim:
1. A network comprising: a group of network nodes, each network node in the group having connectivity under a particular protocol with other network nodes in the group, each network node having a unique node identifier, wherein the network nodes in the group query each other for a group identifier for identifying said group, wherein each network node in the group that fails to receive a response before a time-out condition for its query generates a candidate group identifier, wherein the generated candidate group identifier of a particular network node is adopted as the group identifier when the particular network node responds to queries from other network nodes in the group, wherein said query and response are conducted by using the connectivity under the particular protocol; and a set of network connections for allowing communication between nodes in the group with nodes not in the group, wherein the set of network connections does not support the connectivity under the particular protocol.