Abstract: A method and system for time aligning a frame (60) in a communication network (10) involves the steps of; i) determining if a frame needs to be advanced at a BTS (14), and ii) sending a shortened synchronization pattern from the BSC (12). The BTS (14) then determines if a short or long synchronization pattern has been sent by determining (256) if the received data stream matches a long synchronization pattern and setting a first flag when they do match. If the received data stream does not match the long synchronization pattern and the first flag is set (264), the data stream is compared (266) to the short synchronization pattern. When they match a second flag is set (268).

Abstract: A method and system for controlling an encoding rate in a communication system utilizes feedforward rate information (48) and/or rate desirability information (50) sent from each of a plurality of variable rate vocoders (34) to a communication link output controller (24), such as a network arbitor. The communication link output controller (24) then sends a feedback control signal (32) to a selected variable rate vocoder to change the encoding rate of the selected variable rate vocoder to facilitate re-encoding of the speech packet when a bottleneck is detected. In another embodiment, the network arbitor (134) may additionally and independently modify speech packet data when it determines that a bottleneck may occur. The network arbitor (134) also communicates a packet modification control signal (132) for the variable rate vocoder that generated the dropped packet so that the corresponding variable rate vocoder can adjust its filter states to maintain convergence.