Patent ID: 7013255

Claim:
In a packet-switched network, the network comprising at least one Asynchronous Transfer Mode or ATM switch and at least one ATM device other than the ATM switch, a method for analyzing the behavior of the network by performing steps comprising: (a) determining first and second proportions of a total number of packets transmitted and/or to be transmitted by the ATM network over a selected time interval, wherein the first proportion is associated with first packets of a first packet type and the second proportion is associated with second packets of a second packet type; (b) based on a first mean and variance, generating a first set of packet interarrival times representative of first packets, wherein each first packet has at least one of (i) a packet interarrival time less than a selected value, (ii) a packet payload of voice and/or video information, and (iii) at least a first admission priority, and wherein the distribution of the first set of packet interarrival times is at least substantially lognormal; (c) based on a second mean and variance, generating a second set of packet interarrival times representative of second packets, wherein each second packet has at least one of (i) a packet interarrival time of more than the selected value, (ii) a packet payload of information other than voice and/or video information, and (iii) less than the first admission priority and wherein the distribution of the second set of packet interarrival times is at least substantially normal; and (d) combining the first and second sets of packet interarrival times to provide a synthetic traffic stream, wherein a packet interarrival time is a time interval between the arrivals of temporally adjacent, individual packets.