Patent ID: 7835283

Claim:
A method, comprising: feeding, by a measuring host at an access node of a network, a particular information flow into a packet network for purpose of measurement; measuring, at the measuring host at the access node of the network, characteristics of said information flow in a continual measurement for producing quality of service information, wherein the access node interfaces the network to at least one user terminal; and controlling communications traffic in the packet network on a basis of said quality of service information in order to manage a quality of service in the packet network, wherein the packet network comprises at least two access nodes through which communications traffic is relayed to and from said packet network, and a plurality of communications traffic routes between said access nodes, wherein at least one of the at least two access nodes includes the measuring host, wherein said continual measurement is carried out on a route that goes through said access nodes, wherein said controlling of communication traffic is performed by controlling said plurality of communications traffic routes, wherein the packet network further comprises a quality of service manager, and wherein said continual measurement is performed according to a measurement profile configured in advance at the measuring host by the quality of service manager, the measurement profile includes quality of service parameters including at least one of a delay measurement, a jitter measurement, a packet loss measurement, a packet loss correlation measurement, and a bandwidth measurement, wherein one or more results of the continual measurement performed by the measuring host are delivered to the quality of service manager.