Patent ID: 7996505

Claim:
A computing system supporting network selection based upon network information spanning multiple communication media, the system comprising: a rules data store for maintaining network selection criteria; a media specific module interface for providing accumulated network interface information spanning multiple communication media, the accumulated network interface information being associated with a set of networks and a set of network interfaces, each network interface for connecting the computing system to a network in the set of networks; a rules engine, comprising at least one processor, for designating one of the set of networks by applying a network selection criterion from the rules data store to the accumulated network interface information spanning multiple media; and a plurality of media specific modules configured to acquire network interface information pertaining to network interfaces associated with particular media types, and to receive network interface configuration commands, from the rules engine, to connect to one of the set of networks, each of the media specific modules configured to acquire network interface information from media specific drivers associated with particular interfaces, wherein the media specific module interface comprises a normalization module that converts standardized communication requests it receives from the rules engine into media specific communications that meet media specific implementation requirements, the normalization module further configured to direct the media specific communications to respective network interfaces.