Response scheduling for multiple receivers

• US 20050135410A1
• Filed: 10/19/2004
• Published: 06/23/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 12/18/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Inventors: Stephens, Adrian P.
• Granted Patent: US 8,699,508 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/449
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/189 in combination with wireless systems selective distribution or broadcast in wireless communication networks H04W4/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0289 Congestion control load shedding arrangements in network planning H04W16/08; performing reselection for handling the traffic H04W36/22; wireless traffic scheduling H04W72/12
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/06 using polling

Abstract

A base station poll mobile devices with the same multicast poll, and the polled mobile stations may respond separately at different times based on an assigned delay period for each mobile station that was specified in the poll message.

Claims

1. An apparatus, comprising

a first electronic device adapted to wirelessly transmit a poll comprising:

a first address of a second electronic device and a first time delay indicator indicating a time for the second electronic device to wait before transmitting a first response; and

a second address of a third electronic device and a second time delay indicator indicating a time for the third electronic device to wait before transmitting a second response.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the first time delay includes a delay between an end of the poll and a beginning of the first response.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the first electronic device is further adapted to create a poll group by assigning the first and second addresses to the poll group.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein a difference between a time delay indicated by the first time delay indicator and a time delay indicated by the second time delay indicator is at least as great as a time for the second electronic device to transmit the first response.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the poll comprises a first block of data containing the first address and the first time delay indicator, and further comprises a second block of data containing the second address and the second time delay indicator.

6. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the first and second blocks of data each have a format of a medium access control protocol data unit.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising multiple antennas, wherein the apparatus is to transmit the poll from at least one of the antennas.

8. The of claim 1, wherein the apparatus comprises a base station.

9. An apparatus comprising

an electronic device adapted to:

receive a poll with multiple addresses including a particular address associated with the electronic device, the poll further including a time delay indicator associated with the particular address; and

wirelessly transmit a response to the poll subsequent to an expiration of a time delay indicated by the time delay indicator.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the poll comprises multiple blocks of data, with each block containing a different one of the multiple addresses.

11. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein each of the multiple blocks of data has a format of a medium access control protocol data unit.

12. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the apparatus is a mobile wireless device.

13. The apparatus of claim 9, further comprising at least one antenna to transmit the response.

14. The apparatus of claim 9, further comprising at least one antenna to receive the poll.

15. A method, comprising

transmitting a poll addressed to multiple electronic devices, the poll containing timing indicators to specify how long each addressed electronic device should wait before transmitting a response.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein each of the timing indicators indicates a different amount of time.

17. The method of claim 15, further comprising determining a poll group for the poll prior to said transmitting, the poll group comprising the multiple addresses.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein the poll comprises data formatted as medium access control protocol data units.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein each medium access control protocol data unit comprises one of the device addresses and the associated one of the timing indicators.

20. A method, comprising:

receiving a multicast poll containing a particular identifier and also containing a time delay indicator associated with the particular identifier; and

transmitting a response to the multicast poll subsequent to a time delay indicated by the time delay indicator.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein said receiving comprises determining the particular time delay from the timing indicator.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein said receiving comprises determining a duration of time for said transmitting indicated by a duration indicator received in the multicast poll.

23. An article comprising

a machine-readable medium that provides instruction, which when executed by a processing platform to perform operations comprising:

transmitting a multicast poll addressed to multiple electronic devices, the multicast poll containing a different time delay indicator for each of the multiple addresses; and

receiving a response from each of the multiple electronic devices, each of the responses being received at times indicated by the time delay indicators.

24. The article of claim 23, wherein the multicast poll comprises multiple blocks of data, each block comprising one of the addresses and one of the associated time delay indicators.

25. The article of claim 24, wherein at least one block comprises a duration indicator indicating a length of time associated response.