Patent ID: 8681610

Claim:
A network device for managing a communications between devices, comprising: a buffer for use in receiving and storing packets; and one or more physical devices operative to perform actions comprising: receiving a packet from a sending device; when it is determined that contents of the buffer are above a threshold value and also that the contents of the buffer are increasing, then selectively increasing a delay in sending of an acknowledgement (ACK) to the sending device; when it is determined that both the contents of the buffer are above the threshold value and the contents of the buffer is decreasing, then selectively decreasing the delay of sending the ACK to the sending device; and when it is determined that the contents of the buffer are substantially increasing above the threshold value and a round trip time for the sending device is less than a round trip time for a destination device, selectively sending an explicit congestion notification echo (ECE) to the sending device.