Patent ID: 8391255

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, over a wireless link at a wireless intermediate network node of a wireless mesh network, a first data packet that includes data that indicates that the first data packet was transmitted by a first sending node that is outside of a mesh backhaul, the first sending node being a wireless end node connected by a wire to a wired subnetwork, wherein the first data packet is associated with first configured values for a first minimum wait interval and a first maximum wait interval for reducing contention for the wireless link; receiving, after receiving the first data packet, over the wireless link at the wireless intermediate network node of the wireless mesh network, a second data packet that includes data that indicates that the second data packet was transmitted by a second sending node that is inside the mesh backhaul; identifying the second data packet as a best effort packet or a real time packet; converting, if the second data packet is the real time packet, a priority of the second data packet to a first priority higher than a priority of the first data packet, wherein the conversion is based on the second data packet being received from inside the mesh backhaul and the first data packet being received from outside the mesh backhaul, wherein the conversion of the priority of the second data packet to the first priority is independent of a destination of the second data packet; converting, if the second data packet is the best effort packet, the priority of the second data packet to a second priority lower than the first priority and higher than the priority of the first data packet, wherein the conversion of the priority of the second data packet to the second priority is independent of the destination of the second data packet; and transmitting over the wireless link the second data packet prior to transmitting the first data packet based on the priority of the second data packet being higher than the priority of the first data packet, wherein the second data packet is associated with second configured values for a different second minimum wait interval and a different second maximum wait interval for reducing contention for the wireless link, and wherein the first minimum wait interval is set larger than the second minimum wait interval such that the second data packet clears the mesh backhaul before the first data packet is transmitted.