Patent ID: 8018892

Claim:
A wireless network device for communicating with a network, the wireless network device comprising: a memory configured to store an image comprising a (i) plurality of virtual machines and (ii) a multi-tasking operating system, wherein each of the plurality of virtual machines comprises a wireless network application to execute on the multi-tasking operating system; and store (i) a first queue for a first virtual machine of the plurality of virtual machines, (ii) a second queue for a second virtual machine of the plurality of virtual machines, and (iii) a processor queue; a processor configured to execute the plurality of virtual machines; while executing the first virtual machine, maintain the first queue as a copy of data in the processor queue; and when switching execution to the second virtual machine, replace the processor queue with data from the second queue; and a port comprising a physical-layer device configured to communicate with the network; and a media access controller configured to communicate with the physical-layer device and the processor.