Patent ID: 8681650

Claim:
A method for packet classification previewing, the method comprising: in an impairment instrument: providing a reserved preview packet classifier; providing a plurality of general purpose packet classifiers; receiving user input to classify packets using the preview packet classifier and the general purpose packet classifiers; in response to the user input, initiating classification of packets using the preview packet classifier and the general purpose packet classifiers, wherein the preview packet classifier is configured to classify packets without affecting packet classification by the general purpose packet classifiers or impairments and to provide an indication of the effect of a planned change in packet classification by the general purpose packet classifiers; applying impairments to packets classified by the general purpose packet classifiers, wherein the impairments include at least one of: delay of packets, packet drop, re-ordering of packets, packet duplication, and emulation of error conditions; generating preview packet classification results, wherein generating preview packet classification results includes incrementing a counter if a packet entering the preview packet classifier matches the user input, wherein the counter is configured to provide a non-zero packet count in response to classifying at least one packet matching a configuration of the preview packet classifier, and wherein the non-zero packet count provides an indication to the user that the configuration of the preview packet classifier will function correctly if assigned to one of the general purpose packet classifiers so that the user can copy the configuration of the preview packet classifier to one of the general purpose packet classifiers; and displaying the preview packet classification results to the user.