Patent ID: 8855572

Claim:
A method of controlling a communication link comprising: determining at a receiver whether a packet from a transmitter is received correctly, or is corrupted or lost; provided the packet is determined to be received correctly, determining if the packet is new or a retransmission; provided the packet is determined to be received correctly, sending an acknowledgement packet (ACK) provided a status prohibit timer is not running and provided an ACK prohibit timer is not running; provided the packet is determined to be received correctly and is determined to be a retransmission, stopping an existing negative acknowledgement (NAK) prohibit timer associated with the packet if still running; and provided the packet is determined to be lost or corrupted, and provided there is no existing NAK prohibit timer associated with the packet that is still running, sending a negative acknowledgement packet (NAK) to the transmitter and starting a new NAK prohibit timer associated with the packet in response to the sending of the NAK.