Patent ID: 7436772
Filing Date: 2008-10-14
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A method of measuring available bandwidth over a network path between at least a source computing device and a receiving computing device, the network path comprising a plurality of links, at least one link being a tight link having a lesser amount of available bandwidth than any other link in the network path, the method comprising: transmitting a large pilot packet after it traverses the tight link and before it reaches the receiving computing device; dropping the large pilot packet after it traverses the tight link and before it reaches the receiving computing device, wherein the large pilot packet has a time-to-live parameter and wherein the step of dropping the large pilot packet comprises dropping the large pilot packet upon the expiration of its time-to-live; transmitting a packet pair from the source computing device to the receiving computing device to the receiving computing device immediately following the transmission of the large pilot packet, wherein the packet pair comprises at least two packets separated by an initial delay and does not include another large pilot packet, and wherein each of the at least two pilot packets has a smaller size than the large pilot packet; and obtaining at the source computing device from the receiving computing device an indication of the relative delay between the packets of the packet pair as they arrived at the receiving computing device.