Patent attributes
A local area network includes computers and peripherals networked in a high-speed LAN with access to a WAN through a slower connection via a broadband modem. A LAN gateway device manages data traffic between the local computers and peripherals and between the LAN and the WAN. The LAN gateway device provides multiple features, such as wired or wireless links, security, firewall, NAT, DCHP, traffic management, and the like. Traffic management features include an automatic quality of service priority classification scheme. A quality of service module automatically assigns priorities to the data streams based on analysis of the data packets. Traffic shaping techniques control the LAN gateway upstream output and enable IP fragmentation of TCP packets according to measured upstream channel conditions. The traffic shaping techniques estimate available upstream data rate, available downstream data rate, and the size of datagrams being used on the network link.
