Management of atm virtual circuits with resource reservation protocol

Embodiments of the invention include a method and an architecture for specif ying network resources based on applications requirements. Applications resources are def ined with the Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) Quality of Service (QoS) parameter and the network resources are allocated based on Resource reSerVation Protocol (RSVP) flow s pecifications. An end user or automated application can define the resources desired for their application using a policy mapping database that maps the ATM QoS parameters to the RSVP flow sp ecification. Embodiments of the invention include a method and an architecture for specifying network resources based on applications requirements. Applications resources are defined with the Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) Quality of Service (QoS) parameter and the network resources are allocated based on Resource reSerVation Protocol (RSVP) flow specifications. An end user or automated application can define the resources desired for their application using a policy mapping database that maps the ATM QoS parameters to the RSVP flow specification.