Patent ID: 8462638

Claim:
A method, comprising: receiving, at a first network node, a resource reservation message specifying a first label switched path (LSP), a first priority value, and a first minimum required bandwidth value associated with the first LSP; determining, at the first network node, that a sum of the first minimum required bandwidth value and a second minimum required bandwidth associated with a previously received, second LSP exceeds an available bandwidth of a first link of the first network node to a second network node; determining whether the first priority value indicates that the first LSP has a higher priority than the second LSP; in response to determining that the first LSP has a higher priority than the second LSP, marking the second LSP as soft-preempted and ineligible to reserve bandwidth; sending an error message to a third network node specifying that the second LSP is soft-preempted at the first link of the first node, wherein the third network node is upstream of the first network node, and wherein the third network node is not an origin of the second LSP.