Patent ID: 7646715

Claim:
A device for processing packets of flows on a network link, the device comprising: scheduling means for scheduling packets of flows in a queue in accordance with a fair queuing with priority algorithm, the scheduling means being configured to schedule as priority packets any packets of flows in the queue that are not identified in a list of active flows and as non-priority packets any packets of flows that are already identified in the list of active flows; means for writing flows in and erasing flows from the list of active flows as a function of the arrival and departure of packets of the flows, said means being configured to erase from the list of active flows a flow which has not had any packets in the queue for a certain time period, and thereby assigning priority to the packets of the flows for which a bit rate is below a dynamic threshold, the dynamic threshold being determined by traffic conditions; and admission control means for controlling admission of said packets into the device in accordance with admission criteria; wherein the scheduling means sends the admission control means admissibility condition data including a fair bit rate value that represents the bit rate achieved by a data flow that always has packets to send, and a priority load value which is a sum of the lengths of priority packets transmitted in a certain time period divided by the duration of that time period.