forwarding class

A forwarding class, also called a CoS, provides to NEs a method to weigh the relative importance of one packet over another in a different forwarding class. Each forwarding class is important only in relation to other forwarding classes.

Queues are created for a specific forwarding class to determine the manner in which the queue output is scheduled into the switch fabric and the type of parameters the queue accepts. The forwarding class of the packet, along with the in-profile or out-of-profile state, determines how the packet is queued and handled (the per-hop behavior at each hop along its path to a destination egress point).