Patent ID: 7283552
Filing Date: 2007-10-16
Classification: H04Q

Abstract:
1. A method for scheduling bursts, which carry a quantity of traffic between an origin node and a destination node forming a node pair of a communication network, the method comprising the steps of: a) determining one or more yet-unselected feasible node pairs for timeslots of a finite timeslot sequence, a node pair being feasible in a given timeslot if a burst will neither start concurrently at the origin node with an already-scheduled burst nor, taking delay into account, arrive concurrently at the destination node with an already-scheduled burst; b) selecting a timeslot from said finite timeslot sequence; c) selecting one of said yet-unselected feasible node pairs determined for said selected timeslot; d) scheduling the burst for said selected timeslot and feasible node pair; and e) repeating steps a) to d) until exhaustion of unscheduled demand or of feasible node pairs; wherein a weight is defined as a function of a node pair and a timeslot, and priority is given in step c) to node pair timeslot combinations for which the weight is greatest, the weight of a given node pair timeslot combination increasing with the amount of unscheduled demand between the node pair in the timeslot and varying inversely with a sum of unscheduled demands, said sum being taken over those node pair timeslot combinations that would be rendered unfeasible if the given node pair were scheduled in the given timeslot.