Flow-based call admission control for wireless communication systems

• US 20060252429A1
• Filed: 05/04/2005
• Published: 11/09/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 05/04/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Alcatel-Lucent SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Lucent Technologies, Inc. (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Qinqing, Zhang, Chen, Pi-Chun
• Granted Patent: US 9,277,455 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/450
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/24 Negotiating SLA [Service Level Agreement]; Negotiating QoS [Quality of Service]

Abstract

A wireless communication system (20) includes a call admission module (40) that determines whether to admit a new call based upon a flow of the new call. In a disclosed example, the call admission module (40) predicts a loading of a sector resulting from admission of the new flow. Provided that the new flow will fit within a sector capacity or there are sufficient resources that can be reallocated within the sector to accommodate the new flow and satisfy quality of service requirements for the new flow and existing flows, the new call will be admitted.

Claims

1. A method of communicating, comprising:

determining whether to admit a new call based on a flow of the new call.

2. The method of claim 1, comprising

determining whether the flow of the new call will fit within a capacity of a sector;

and

admitting the new call to the sector if the flow of the new call will fit within the capacity of the sector.

3. The method of claim 2, comprising

determining a current load of the sector;

determining a contribution of the flow of the new call to the load; and

determining whether the current load and the contribution of the flow of the new call fit within the capacity.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein determining the current load of the sector comprises determining a contribution to the current load from each of a plurality of classes of flows

5. The method of claim 4, comprising determining whether the flow of the new call can utilize at least some of the capacity currently associated with at least one of the classes of flows of the current load in place of at least some of the flows of the at least one class

6. The method of claim 5, comprising admitting the new call if the flow of the new call has a higher priority than at least one current flows class or a determined current load and the flow of the new call fit within the capacity of the sector.

7. The method of claim 1, comprising

determining a priority of the flow of the new call;

and

admitting the new call if the flow is in a high priority category.

8. The method of claim 7, comprising allocating at least some of the capacity previously allocated to at least one flow having a lower priority for the new call.

9. The method of claim 1, comprising determining a long term and short term predicted total loading and comparing each with a corresponding threshold to determine whether to admit the new call.

10. The method of claim 9, comprising using one of a plurality of thresholds depending on the flow of the new call.

11. The method of claim 10, comprising using a plurality of thresholds for one type of flow and selecting one of the thresholds based on a type of application used for the new call.

12. The method of claim 9, comprising selecting a threshold that corresponds to always admitting the new call if the new call is for a soft handoff.

13. The method of claim 1, comprising determining a resulting load if admitting the new call including discounting a portion of the load resulting from at least one low priority flow if the flow of the new call is a high priority flow.

14. The method of claim 1, comprising

determining that the flow of the new call is a low priority flow;

and

admitting the new call with a merge threshold corresponding to infinity for the low priority flow of the new call.

15. The method of claim 1, comprising admitting the new call and setting a merge threshold for any existing low priority flows to a value corresponding to infinity.

16. The method of claim 1, comprising admitting the new call if the new call is for a soft handoff.

17. The method of claim 1, comprising determining the flow of the new call including inspecting an encoder packet of the new call.

18. The method of claim 1, comprising determining the flow of the new call including obtaining information regarding an encoder packet of the new call from a radio network controller that processed the encoder packet.