Patent ID: 8924547

Claim:
A network management system, comprising: a management server coupled to a network; and a plurality of network devices coupled to the network, the network devices configured to communicate with the management server via the network, the network devices configured to transmit check-in requests to the management server via the network, wherein the management server is configured to determine, in response to one of the check-in requests received from one of the network devices during a communication session initiated by the one check-in request, at least one task that requires communication with the one network device, wherein the management server is configured to determine a first weight value indicating an expected processing burden for the management server in performing the one task, wherein the management server is configured to maintain a second weight value indicating an overall processing burden for the management server for each of a plurality of tasks currently being performed by the management server, and wherein the management server is configured to update the second weight value based on the first weight value in response to the one check-in request and to determine whether to perform the one task during the communication session based on a comparison of the second weight value to a predefined threshold.