COMPUTER PROGRAM PRODUCT, APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR MONITORING NETWORK AND REGULATING PACKETS ON A NETWORK PATH

A network monitoring apparatus retrieves packets flowing on a path to be monitored on a network using a packet capturing unit. A packet analyzing unit analyzes the retrieved packets. Although the network monitoring apparatus discards some of the packets using a sampling unit, a sampling rate is determined by a sampling-rate regulating unit. A resource-usage-amount measuring unit measures how many resources are actually used inside the network monitoring apparatus and the sampling rate determined by the sampling-rate regulating unit is based on a resource usage amount.