Patent ID: 8385210

Claim:
An apparatus, comprising: a service element that includes one or more queues that are coupled to one or more processor engines and to one or more processing units, wherein an accumulated delay for a selected one of the queues is determined by identifying a number of packets within the selected queue that involve intensive processing and a number of packets within the selected queue that involve nominal processing, and wherein the service element evaluates header information in individual packets in order to identify delay characteristics, and wherein the accumulated delay is compared to a threshold value to determine whether to adjust a processing mode of the one or more processor engines, and wherein if the threshold value is exceeded, new flows associated with a specific type of service are not processed based on identifying that the new flows have less priority that other flows propagating through the service element, and wherein a processing unit is configured to calculate an average processing time for groupings of the packets and to update weights associated with the groupings in order to adjust the accumulated delay.