Method and apparatus for control of flow rates

A method comprising:

• storing packets in at least one queue, wherein the packets include first packets and second packets, wherein the first packets belong to at least one first flow, wherein the second packets belong to at least one second flow;
• scheduling, by a scheduler, transmission of the stored packets via at least one network link and extracting the stored packets from the in at least one queue based on the scheduled transmission;
• marking, by a policer, some of the first packets with a congestion indicator before transmission;
• determining respective serving rates for the at least one first flow and the at least one second flow, a serving rate being determined for a flow and indicating a rate with which packets of the considered flow are extracted by the scheduler;
• computing, for at least one flow among the at least one first flow, a respective target serving rate to converge to, wherein a target serving rate for a flow is computed based on the serving rates;
• configuring the policer with a policer parameter for controlling an amount of packets to be marked in a flow among the at least one first flow, wherein the policer parameter is based on the target serving rate determined for the considered flow.

A network node comprising:

• at least one processor;
• at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the network node to carry out:
• storing packets in at least one queue, wherein the packets include first packets and second packets, wherein the first packets belong to at least one first flow, wherein the second packets belong to at least one second flow;
• scheduling, by a scheduler, transmission of the stored packets via at least one network link and extracting the stored packets from the in at least one queue based on the scheduled transmission;
• marking, by a policer, some of the first packets with a congestion indicator before transmission;
• determining respective serving rates for the at least one first flow and the at least one second flow, a serving rate being determined for a flow and indicating a rate with which packets of the considered flow are extracted by the scheduler;
• computing, for at least one flow among the at least one first flow, a respective target serving rate to converge to, wherein a target serving rate for a flow is computed based on the serving rates;
• configuring the policer with a policer parameter for controlling an amount of packets to be marked in a flow among the at least one first flow, wherein the policer parameter is based on the target serving rate determined for the considered flow.