Patent ID: 7885243

Claim:
A wireless mesh network comprising: an access server wherein the access server sets one or more functioning parameters of the wireless mesh network; one or more root nodes connected to said access server and an external network; one or more AP nodes wherein each AP node is in wireless two-way data communication with an associated parent node wherein said associated parent node is selected from all available parent nodes wherein an available parent node is another AP node within wireless communication range of the AP node and the associated parent node is an available parent node meeting one or more communication criteria or the associated parent node is a root node within wireless communication range; wherein an AP node is in wireless communication with zero or more clients; and wherein an AP node includes a means for switching two-way data communication from a first associated parent node to a second associated parent node based on the functioning parameters of the wireless mesh network and wherein an AP node contains one or more datasets; wherein the communication criteria comprises instructions for the AP node to select the associated parent node wherein an available parent node is selected to become the associated parent node if the available parent node is in wireless communication with a root node or if a root node is contained in the available parent node's route path dataset; wherein one of the datasets contained in an AP node comprises a route path dataset comprising an identifier for the associated parent node appended to the route path dataset for the associated parent node; and wherein one of the datasets contained in the AP node comprises an amount of AP data traffic wherein the amount of AP data traffic comprises the amount of data exchanged between the AP node and the zero or more clients in communication with the node and wherein another of the datasets contained in the AP node comprises a maximum capacity amount of the AP node.