Patent ID: 7953000

Claim:
A method for a network node in a computer network to allocate network resources for a new data flow, the method comprising: receiving a request to reserve network resources for the new data flow; determining whether the requested network resources are available; if the requested resources are determined to be unavailable, performing, by a processor, the steps of: selecting an existing data flow to preempt from a plurality of existing data flows that have lower priority values than a priority value associated with the new data flow, the selecting based on a predefined set of rules, the predefined set of rules being common to a plurality of nodes in the computer network, the predefined set of rules to consistently select the same existing data flow at each node of the plurality of nodes; determining whether the selected data flow participates in a fate-sharing group of data flows, where utility of data flows in the fate-sharing group depends on all data flows in the fate-sharing group being operational; if the selected data flow is determined to participate in a fate-sharing group of data flows, preempting every data flow in the fate-sharing group, otherwise preempting the selected data flow, thereby freeing network resources previously reserved for the data flows in the fate-sharing group or, the selected data flow, as the case may be; and reallocating at least some of the freed network resources for the new data flow.