Patent ID: 8737240

Claim:
A link band estimating apparatus, for communication between nodes that connect to a network via a radio link or a plurality of radio links and between nodes that communicate to one another via a plurality of networks that are different from each other, comprising: hardware; a packet transmitting unit implemented at least by the hardware to transmit a plurality of packets transmitted from each of a plurality of communication routes via a link to be measured from among radio links; a packet interval measuring unit implemented at least by the hardware to measure an interval by which said packets are spaced apart in the link to be measured on the communication routes; and a band calculating unit implemented at least by the hardware to calculate the band of the link to be measured based on a value measured by said packet interval measuring unit and a data size of said packets, wherein a transmission node of the nodes is connected to the network via links that are connected in parallel, a reception node is connected to the network via one or more links, including the link to be measured, that are connected in parallel, the communication routes include communication paths that are formed between the transmission node and the reception node, each communication path including a corresponding link, the link to be measured, and the network, a first packet and a third packet of the packets are continuous in the link to be measured, resulting from the link band estimating apparatus transmitting a first row of packets consisting of plural packets including the first packet from the transmission node to a first link from among the links, and transmits a second row of packets consisting of plural packets including the third packet from the first node to a second link from among the links, the interval is an interval by which the packets, included in the first row of packets, are spaced apart from one another in the link to be measured is measured, and the band of the link to be measured is calculated according to the interval and according to the data size of each packet.