Patent ID: 8284795

Claim:
A method for determining differential delay between at least two bonded links, comprising: receiving, at a receiving entity, via a first bonded link, a data packet from a transmitting entity, comprising: a time stamp indicating a point of time when the data packet was generated; and an applied delay value indicating a link transmission delay applied to the data packet before transmission, the applied delay value being contained in a field in the data packet, and wherein the applied delay value is derived, at least in part, on a delay request received by the transmitting entity from the receiving entity; deriving a propagation delay of the first bonded link based on the applied delay value, the time indicated by the time stamp, and a time of arrival of the data packet; and determining a differential delay of the first bonded link from the propagation delay of the first bonded link and a propagation delay of a second bonded link.