Patent ID: 7102997

Claim:
A method of providing transparent local area network (LAN) service in a ring network, comprising: allocating respective proportions of data transmission capacity of the ring to different closed user groups (CUGs), each closed user group including a corresponding plurality of LAN clients of the transparent LAN service; and at each of a plurality of network devices attached to the ring: (1) monitoring the use of a connected segment of the ring for both pass-through and locally-generated traffic by the LAN clients on a per-CUG basis; and (2) upon detecting that use of the connected segment for a given CUG is approaching the proportion of ring data transmission capacity allocated to the CUG, selecting an active one of the LAN clients of the CUG and sending a throttle message to the selected LAN client, the throttle message indicating that the LAN client is to reduce its data transmission rate.