Patent ID: 8315626

Claim:
A method of connecting a wireless station to a wireless network, comprising: prior to associating to a preferred access point from among a plurality of wireless access points, receiving a pre-connection management signal from each of the plurality of wireless access points, wherein: each of the wireless access points connects an upstream network that is upstream of the access point to a downstream wireless network that is downstream of the access point, and each of the pre-connection management signals conveys information regarding services available from the upstream network that connects to the wireless access point corresponding to the pre-connection management signal; from each of the received pre-connection management signals, retrieving characteristics of the wireless access point corresponding to the pre-connection management signal, wherein: the characteristics comprise information regarding an availability status of an internet connection of the upstream network that connects to the wireless access point corresponding to the pre-connection management signal; for each wireless access point for which the characteristics have been retrieved, evaluating the characteristics of the wireless access point, wherein the evaluating includes: comparing each of the characteristics of each wireless access point to a stored criticality rating for each characteristic; comparing the wireless access points that have the characteristic with the highest criticality rating; among the wireless access points that have the characteristic with the highest criticality rating, comparing those wireless access points that have the characteristic with the next lower criticality rating; and continuing the previous comparing for each lower criticality rating; and based on the evaluation of the characteristics of the wireless access points for which the characteristics have been retrieved, identifying the preferred access point from the plurality of wireless access points, wherein the preferred access point is among the wireless access points that have been compared from highest criticality rating to lowest criticality rating.