Patent ID: 7746784

Claim:
A method for balancing traffic in a load-balancing network comprising a plurality of nodes, comprising: determining a status of the plurality of nodes wherein a first portion of designated ones of the plurality of nodes comprises uncongested nodes, and a second portion of the designated ones of the plurality of nodes comprises congested nodes; splitting a traffic flow into a plurality of traffic flow parts associated with designated ones of the plurality of nodes using determined node congestion status information to achieve a first average traffic volume split across each of the uncongested nodes in the first portion of the designated ones of the plurality of nodes that is greater than a second average traffic volume split across each of the congested nodes in the second portion of the designated ones of the plurality of nodes, wherein, for each of at least one of the plurality of nodes, the node congestion status information enables a determination as to whether at least one queue of the node has a congestion condition associated therewith, the at least one queue of the node comprising at least one of: a queue associated with traffic distributed in a first traffic distribution round, wherein distributing traffic in the first traffic distribution round comprises splitting traffic entering the load-balancing network for distribution toward at least a portion of the plurality of nodes; or a queue associated with traffic routed in a second traffic distribution round, wherein routing traffic in the second traffic distribution round comprises routing traffic received during a first traffic distribution toward at least one of the plurality of nodes; and distributing the traffic flow parts toward the designated ones of the plurality of nodes in a first traffic distribution round.