Patent ID: 7995478

Claim:
A method for network communication between a first host and a second host connected by a network, the method comprising: a) sending a plurality of test packets of varying transmission unit (TU) size from the first host to the second host, wherein a “do not fragment” (DF) flag for the test packets is not set; b) determining whether one or more of the test packets were received by the second host; c) determining whether a network path between the first and second hosts is bit-rate limited or packet rate limited based on one or more patterns of receipt of the test packets by the second host; c′) calculating an estimated path MTU size for the network path between the first and second hosts based on the one or more patterns of receipt of the test packets by the second host, wherein the path MTU size is determined differently if the network path is bit-rate limited than if the network path is packet rate limited; and d) sending one or more message packets of a size less than or equal to the estimated path MTU size over the network path.