Patent ID: 7779065

Claim:
A method for determining a route through a network, the method comprising: identifying a plurality of routes, wherein each route comprises a plurality of links; calculating a route cost for each route by summing a link cost calculated for each link of the plurality of links; and selecting a route based on the calculated route costs; wherein the link cost for each link is calculated by determining a weighting value for a routing factor of a plurality of routing factors; determining a cost value by matching an allowable value of the routing factor to a characteristic of the link; determining a weighted cost value by combining the determined weighting value with the determined cost value; repeating the determining operations for each of the plurality of routing factors; and summing the determined weighted cost value for each of the plurality of routing factors to determine the link cost; selecting the plurality of routing factors from a set of routing factors; for each selected routing factor, selecting one or more allowable values; assigning a weight to each selected routing factor; and for each selected routing factor, assigning each selected allowable value a cost.