Congestion control in a network device having a buffer circuit

1. A method for providing data packet congestion control for a data network having a buffer circuit, each data packet comprising a priority, the method comprising the steps of:

determining a particular service flow associated with a data packet;

detecting a data packet flow rate through the data network for the particular service flow associated with the data packet;

quantizing the data packet flow rate into at least one level;

detecting a buffer circuit depth;

determining the priority associated with the current data packet;

processing the packet in response to the current data packet flow rate, the data packet priority, and the current buffer circuit depth; and

determining a probability of dropping the data packet using the data packet flow rate, the data packet priority, and the buffer circuit depth to access, from a matrix of plots indicating the probability of dropping the data packet, each of the plots within the matrix of plots indicating the packet drop probability as a function of the buffer circuit depth.

2. A method for providing data packet congestion control for a data network having a buffer circuit, each data packet comprising a priority, the method comprising the steps of:

determining a particular service flow associated with a data packet;

detecting a data packet flow rate through the data network for the particular service flow associated with the data packet;

quantizing the data packet flow rate into at least one level;

detecting a buffer circuit depth;

determining the priority associated with the current data packet;

processing the packet in response to the current data packet flow rate, the data packet priority, and the current buffer circuit depth; and

determining a probability of dropping the data packet using the data packet flow rate, the data packet priority, and the buffer circuit depth to access, from a matrix of plots indicating the probability of dropping the data packet, each of the plots within the matrix of plots indicating the packet drop probability as a function of the buffer circuit depth with plots that have the same shape and parameters as the plots used for random early Discard congestion control techniques.

3. A method for providing data packet congestion control for a data network having a buffer circuit, each data packet having a priority associated therewith, the method comprising the steps of:

determining a particular service flow associated with a data packet;

detecting a current data packet flow rate through the data network for the particular service flow associated with the data packet;

quantizing the current data packet flow rate into one of four different flow rate categories by comparing the service flow's data packet flow rate with a minimum data rate threshold, a mid-level data rate threshold and a maximum data rate threshold, a first of the four different flow rate categories corresponding to a flow rate that is less than the minimum data rate threshold, a second category corresponding to a flow rate that is greater than the minimum threshold but less than the mid-level threshold, a third category corresponding to a flow rate that is greater than the mid-level threshold but less than the maximum threshold and a forth category corresponding to a flow rate that is greater than the maximum threshold;

determining the priority associated with the data packet; and

processing the data packet in response to the current data packet flow rate category, the data packet priority, and a current buffer circuit depth.