Patent ID: 7420952

Claim:
A method of controlling a wireless mesh network, comprising: a) configuring the wireless mesh network with a first configuration, the wireless mesh network comprising a plurality of relay nodes, each of the relay nodes being capable of relaying traffic from a child node associated with the relay node, each of the relay nodes including a first radio interface configurable to relay traffic to a parent relay node and a second dual purpose radio interface configurable to both relay traffic from the child relay node and to communicate with a client node that is not a relay node, and at least one of the relay nodes is configured in the first configuration to relay traffic from a child relay node to a parent relay node; b) determining that a first one of the plurality of relay nodes in the wireless mesh network requires a channel selection change; c) dynamically selecting a second one of the plurality of relay nodes in the wireless mesh network to form a parent-child relationship with the first relay node; and d) making a channel selection change; wherein prior to being dynamically selected, the second relay node was a sibling node of the first relay node; and making a channel selection includes making a channel selection change to meet a performance requirement.