Patent ID: 7937490

Claim:
A method comprising: a step for maintaining a server load metric for each server in a group of servers; a step for parsing application content from a packet; a step for selecting a destination server from the group of servers, the step for selecting the destination server being dependent on the server load metric for each server; a step for assigning a priority to the packet, the priority being dependent on the application content; and a step for transmitting the packet to the destination server according to a transmitting schedule, the transmitting schedule being dependent on the priority, wherein the priority comprises a first priority or a second priority, the second priority is lower than the first priority, the destination server has a workload above a first redetermined level, and the transmitting schedule is constructed such that, if the packet comprises the first priority then the packet is transmitted to the destination server without delay and if the packet comprises the second priority then the packet is held back from being transmitted to the destination server.