Patent ID: 6985455

Claim:
A method of performing bandwidth allocations, the method comprising: receiving a bandwidth request from a terminal, wherein the bandwidth request includes a rate request; determining bandwidth request type and priority of the received bandwidth request; placing the bandwidth request in one of a plurality of a global queues based upon the determining step, each of the global queues corresponding to a data rate of each of a plurality of channels; moving the bandwidth request from the one global queue to one of a plurality of local queues, the plurality of local queues corresponding to the plurality of channels, wherein the bandwidth request is moved based on loading of the channels; filling the one local queue with subsequent rate requests up to a queuing threshold that is dynamically established according to a total number of rate requests in the local queues; filling another one of the local queues with additional rate requests upon filling the one local queue beyond the queuing threshold; and allocating transmission slots in response to the bandwidth request stored in the one local queue.