Patent ID: 7822867

Claim:
A method of sending a stream of data packets from a server to a client, the client simultaneously using, at a constant bit rate D, the data that it receives, comprising the steps of: determining that a packet sent by the server has not been received by the client, sending the packet by the server that has not been received by the client again to the client at a given time ΔT after it was first sent, the time ΔT satisfying ΔT×D<S; and wherein the packet sent by the server but not received by the client is sent again to the client only if the latter has already previously received a given number of packets sent by the server, wherein the stream of data packets from the server to the client is composed of a main stream P, a retransmission stream R for sending again the packets that have not been received by the client and an advance stream A for accumulating the data at the client, the rate of the main stream P being fixed at D and the rate of the advance stream A being fixed at a given value when the rate of the retransmission stream R is zero, the rate of the advance stream A being zero and the sum of the rates of the main stream P and of the retransmission stream R being fixed at the rate D when the rate of the retransmission stream R is not zero or when the client has accumulated data beyond a given threshold S.