Method and system for interfacing communication networks

A gateway device comprising:

• a memory to store operations, and
• a processor or processors to perform the operations, the operations comprising:
• communicate with a first packet-switched network, the first packet-switched network comprising a source node;
• communicate with a sourced-selected path network at a first node;
• determine a second node based on destination information related to a destination node and based on a load and/or a reachability and a geographic location of the second node, said second node connected to the first node through the sourced-selected path network and a second packet-switched network, the second packet-switched network comprising the destination node;
• transmit a data packet to the destination node;
• determine a plurality of attributes related to the data packet;
• select a preferred path from a plurality of available paths based on a decision rule, wherein the decision rule specifies for at least one attribute a preferred range of path parameters,
• wherein the first node constitutes an entry gateway between a first subnet of a packet-switched network or a first packet-switched network and the source-selected path routing network, and wherein the second node constitutes an exit gateway between the source-selected path routing network and a second subnet of the packet-switched network or a second packet-switched network,
• wherein the first subnet is different from the second subnet, and/or the first packet-switched network is different from the second packet-switched network,
• wherein the first node and the source node belong to the first subnet of a packet-switched network or to the first packet-switched network, wherein the second node and the destination node belong to the second subnet of the packet-switched network or to the second packet-switched network,
• wherein the plurality of attributes related to the data packet is determined from a header of the data packet using packet inspection,
• wherein the plurality of attributes related to the data packet comprises a traffic class and/or a source and/or destination application,
• determine a plurality of path parameters comprises measurements of network properties for at least a subset of the plurality of available paths, and
• wherein the network properties comprise latency, bandwidth, throughput, jitter, packet loss and/or maximum transmission unit,
• select the preferred path from the plurality of available paths based on a decision rule comprises, wherein the decision rule is associated with a quantity representative of a deviation between path parameters and the preferred range of path parameters;
• and
• select the preferred path based on the quantities by minimizing a sum of the quantities.

Anon-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions that when executed by a processor or processers cause a computing system to:

• receive a data packet at a first node, wherein the data packet was sent from a source node according to next-hop routing;
• transmit at least part of the data contained in the data packet from the first node to a second node according to source-selected path routing;
• transmit the data received at the second node to a destination node according to next-hop routing;
• determine the second node based on destination information related to the destination node and based on a load and/or a reachability and a geographic location of the second node;
• determine, for at least a subset of a plurality of available paths between the first node and the second node, a plurality of path parameters;
• determine a plurality of attributes related to the first data packet;
• and
• select a preferred path from the plurality of available paths based on a decision rule, wherein the decision rule specifies a preferred range of path parameters for at least one attribute,
• wherein the first node constitutes an entry gateway between a first subnet of a packet-switched network or a first packet-switched network and the source-selected path routing network, and wherein the second node constitutes an exit gateway between the source-selected path routing network and a second subnet of the packet-switched network or a second packet-switched network,
• wherein the first subnet is different from the second subnet, and/or the first packet-switched network is different from the second packet-switched network,
• wherein the first node and the source node belong to the first subnet of a packet-switched network or to the first packet-switched network, wherein the second node and the destination node belong to the second subnet of the packet-switched network or to the second packet-switched network,
• wherein the plurality of attributes related to the data packet is determined from a header of the data packet using inspection,
• wherein the plurality of attributes related to the first data packet comprises a traffic class and/or a source and/or destination application,
• wherein determining the plurality of path parameters comprises measurements of network properties for at least a subset of the plurality of available paths,
• wherein the network properties comprise latency, bandwidth, throughput, jitter, packet loss and/or maximum transmission unit, and
• wherein selecting the preferred path from the plurality of available paths based on a decision rule comprises:
• determining, for at least a subset of the plurality of available paths, a quantity representative of a deviation between path parameters and the preferred range of path parameters;
• and
• selecting the preferred path based on the quantities by minimizing a sum of the quantities.