Patent ID: 8320245

Claim:
A policy enforcement point (PEP), comprising: a processor for attachment to an edge of a packet-switched network providing for autonomous short-term, application-aware controls applied to autonomously control admission of corresponding network ingress traffic to said packet-switched network, and further providing for long-term traffic controls on said corresponding network ingress traffic; and a memory storing a plurality of admission control tables downloadable from a session/call admission controller (S/CAC) independently located within the topology of said packet-switched network, wherein the admission control tables are used by the PEP to implement said long-term traffic admission controls that differentiate between traffic classes and the admission control tables are automatically updated by the S/CAC and downloaded from the S/CAC in response to a change in packet-switched network topology or bandwidth reservation capacity due to a network failure; wherein, the admission control tables are disposed in the memory of the PEP to locally dictate how much application traffic in each traffic class can be admitted, wherein voice, video, and data application traffic streams are discriminated and prioritized, and is such that when a new call or session is presented to said PEP, the admission control tables are consulted to determine if enough bandwidth in that class is reserved for said new call and whether said new call can be admitted, and if not then consulting said S/CAC to obtain increased bandwidth reservations.