perform the procedures 300 and 350 described in reference to fig3 a and 3b in reference to fig7 a and to fig7 b in one embodiment the traffic allocations which are determined based on traffic weight or traffic rate values are set on the router 705 755 by way of a message signal or other indication 716 766 in another embodiment not shown traffic rate or traffic weight values are sent to the configuring device 700 750 e g from the wfq calculator of fig1 or from a network management element as a message signal or other indication such a message signal or indication may be received by the configuring device 700 750 through an appropriate interface in yet another embodiment not shown the traffic rate or traffic weight values are entered into the configuring device 700 750 by a user who uses a graphical interface like the one shown in fig1 the configuring devices 700 and 750 may be a physical node in a network like the computers 50 60 in the network 70 of fig5 or other network devices such as a switch optical transport system or the router 600 of fig6 the devices 700 and 750 may be part of a physical network node.