Patent ID: 8145770

Claim:
A method for dynamically allocating bandwidth in communications systems, the method comprising: managing one or more sessions between a plurality of communications devices on a communications channel, wherein media characteristics are associated with each session, the media characteristics comprising at least one of: a codec, a bitrate, a resolution, a maximum granularity for video streams, a sampling rate for audio streams, a frame rate, and a packet size, and wherein each session has original media characteristics; detecting at least one of: a change in one of the sessions on the communications channel, an addition of an additional session on the communications channel, a removal of one of the sessions from the communications channel, a change in capabilities of one of the sessions on the communications channel, a change in capabilities of the communications channel, and a change in capabilities of one of the plurality of communications devices; in response to the detection, determining alternate media characteristics to be used by the one or more sessions on the communications channel, wherein the determination comprises: creating a plurality of media characteristic combinations from every possible combination of the media characteristics associated with the one or more sessions; for each of the plurality of media characteristic combinations, calculating a Quality Drop Coefficient (QDC) for each session that uses the communications channel, wherein the QDC is computed based at least in part on the original media characteristics associated with each session and suggested media characteristics to apply in response to the detection; and calculating a Quality Drop Value (QDV) for each of the plurality of media characteristic combinations from each calculated QDC weighted by a number of affected sessions, wherein the media characteristic combination having the lowest QDV is designated as the alternate media characteristics; and setting the media characteristics associated with each session on the communications channel to the alternate media characteristics.