Method and associated apparatus for distributed dynamic paging area clustering under heterogeneous access networks

• US 20060025161A1
• Filed: 09/19/2005
• Published: 02/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 10/04/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NTT Docomo Incorporated (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation)
• Original Assignee: NTT Docomo Incorporated (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation)
• Inventors: Takeshita, Atsushi, Funato, Daichi
• Granted Patent: US 7,574,223 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/458
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/02 Arrangements for optimising operational condition
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 68/04 multi-step notification using statistical or historical mobility data

Abstract

In a telecommunication system, paging areas may be automatically reconfigured as required. Paging areas can be adaptively reconfigured in accordance with changes in movement traffic of mobile hosts. The system and method work under a constraint that only a limited number of area IDs are permitted for each paging unit area. Also, the system and method work over heterogeneous access networks. Thus, according to the presently disclosed embodiments, paging areas reconfigure themselves according to changes in movement traffic of mobile hosts.

Claims

1. A method of operating a mobile host in a telecommunication system, the method comprising:

receiving at the mobile host paging area identification information;

transmitting location information from the mobile host to an access point of the telecommunication system;

receiving at the mobile host subsequent paging area identification information;

upon detecting a location change of the mobile host, transmitting old location information to a new access point of the telecommunication system.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein transmitting the old location information includes transmitting the received paging area identification information.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein receiving paging area identification information comprises receiving a paging area identifier transmitted by an access point of the telecommunications network, the paging area identifier being for a current paging area associated with a transmitting access point.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

comparing the received paging area identification information with stored paging area identification information; and

when the received paging area identification information does not match the stored paging area identification information, transmitting the the old location information to a new access point.

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16. A data structure storable on a data storage medium, the data structure comprising:

a plurality of data elements representative of movements of mobile hosts in a telecommunication system.

17. The data structure of claim 16 wherein the data structure comprises:

a first map in which data elements are stored according to paging area identifiers and network address identifiers of the telecommunication system; and

a second map produced based on the first map in which data elements are stored according to paging area identifiers of the telecommunication system.

18. The data structure of claim 16 wherein the data elements are probabilities of mobile host movement based on reported mobile host movements.

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25. A cluster map data structure storable on a data storage medium, the data structure comprising:

a plurality of data elements representative of dynamically reconfigurable clusters of paging areas in a telecommunication system.

26. The cluster map data structure of claim 25 wherein the plurality of data elements comprise:

default data elements storing default information for a respective paging area;

branch data elements storing branch information for the respective paging area; and

root data elements storing rood information for the respective paging area.

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