Methods and apparatus for communicating transmission backlog information

• US 20070159969A1
• Filed: 01/17/2006
• Published: 07/12/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 12/22/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Inventors: Das, Arnab, Laroia, Rajiv, Li, Junyi
• Granted Patent: US 8,437,251 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/229
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/21 in the uplink direction of a wireless link, i.e. towards the network
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/52 based on load

Abstract

An uplink dedicated control channel reporting structure includes a plurality of different bit size reports, e.g. 1 bit, 3 bit and 4 bit reports, for reporting a wireless terminal'"'"'s backlog information of uplink traffic request group queues. Smaller bit size reports are transmitted more frequently than larger reports. A 1 bit request report indicates whether or not there are any MAC frames of information to be communicated in a set of two request group queues. A 3 bit request report indicates an amount of backlog information corresponding to a first set of request group queues and a second set of request group queues. A 4 bit request report indicates an amount of backlog information corresponding to a set of request group queues. The 4 bit request report is capable of reporting information on any of a plurality of uplink traffic channel request group queues being maintained by the wireless terminal.

Claims

1. A method of reporting transmission backlog information, the method comprising:

operating a mobile node to transmit backlog information using a plurality of reports of different sizes over a period of time.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a first fixed size and a second fixed size, reports of said second fixed size being larger than reports of said first fixed size.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a third fixed size which is larger than said second fixed size.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said first, second and third fixed sizes are each less than 10 information bits in size.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein at least two of said first, second and third fixed sizes each include less than 5 information bits.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein said first, second and third fixed sizes each include less than 5 information bits.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein at least one of said first, second and third fixed sized is a size of one information bit.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein said second size is 3 information bits and said third size is 4 information bits.

9. The method of claim 2, wherein said step of transmitting includes transmitting more first size reports than said second size reports during said time period.

10. The method of claim 2, wherein the smallest size report is used for highest priority traffic.

11. The method of claim 2, wherein the first fixed size is one bit and wherein the one bit indicates the existence of information to be transmitted or lack thereof.

12. The method of claim 10 wherein highest priority is voice or control traffic.

13. The method of claim 2, wherein said reports report information on a plurality of queues, each report providing information on the backlog of one or more request groups.

14. The method claim 2, wherein the first fixed size is one bit and wherein the one bit report provides backlog information on the combined backlog corresponding to two different queues.

15. The method of claim 3, wherein the second fixed size is 3 bits, wherein the third fixed size is 4 bits, and wherein the 3 bit report communicates a delta from a 4 bit report in at least some cases.

16. The method of claim 2, wherein the second fixed size is 3 bits and wherein the 3 bit report provides information on two sets of queues.

17. The method of claim 3, wherein the third fixed size is 4 bits, and wherein the 4 bit report provides information on one set of queues.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the one set of queues includes 1 request group queue, two request group queues, or three request group queues.

19. The method of claim 3, wherein the plurality of reports are transmitted on a time shared basis.

20. The method of claim 3, wherein a dedicated control channel segment includes at most one of said first, second and third fixed size reports communicating transmit backlog information.

21. The method of claim 3, wherein each dedicated control channel segment dedicated to the wireless terminal provides an opportunity for the wireless terminal to communicate one of said first, second, and third fixed size reports used to communicate transmit backlog information.

22. The method of claim 3, wherein the wireless terminal includes a predetermined number of request group queues for uplink traffic and wherein the third fixed size report is capable of communicating backlog information corresponding to any of different request group queues.

23. A wireless terminal, comprising:

a queue status monitoring module for monitoring the amount of information in at least one of a plurality of different queues used to store information to be transmitted;

a transmission backlog report generation module for generating different bit size backlog information reports providing transmission backlog information; and

a transmission backlog report control module for controlling the transmission of generated backlog information reports.

24. The wireless terminal of claim 23, further comprising:

stored transmission backlog reporting schedule information used by said transmission backlog report control module in determining when to transmit a report of a particular bit size.

25. The wireless terminal of claim 24, further comprising:

an OFDM transmitter for transmitting at least some of said generated backlog information reports.

26. The wireless terminal of claim 23, further comprising:

a transmitter for transmitting transmission backlog information reports in uplink control channel segments dedicated to said wireless terminal.

27. The wireless terminal of claim 26, wherein each of said uplink control channel segments dedicated to said wireless terminal are of a uniform size;

and

wherein each segment includes at most one transmission backlog information report, each segment including additional bits not used for transmitting backlog information.

28. The wireless terminal of claim 27, further comprising:

a coding module for coding information to be transmitted in said dedicated uplink control channel segments, for at least some segments, said coding module coding a transmission backlog report with at least one additional report used to communicate non-backlog control information.

29. The wireless terminal of claim 28, wherein said at least one additional report is one of:

a signal to noise ratio report, a self noise report, an interference report, and a wireless terminal transmission power report.

30. The wireless terminal of claim 23, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a first fixed size and a second fixed size, reports of said second fixed size being larger than reports of said first fixed size.

31. The wireless terminal of claim 24, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a third fixed size which is larger than said second fixed size.

32. The wireless terminal of claim 31, wherein said first, second and third fixed sizes are each less than 10 information bits in size.

33. The wireless terminal of claim 32, further comprising:

stored report information indicating a mapping between queue status information and bit patterns that can be communicated using said reports of said first and second sizes.

36. The wireless terminal of claim 32, wherein at least two of said first, second and third fixed sizes each include less than 5 information bits.

37. The wireless terminal of claim 36, wherein said first, second and third fixed sizes each include less than 5 information bits.

38. The wireless terminal of claim 37, wherein at least one of said first, second and third fixed sized is a size of one information bit.

39. The wireless terminal of claim 38, wherein said second size is 3 information bits and said third size is 4 information bits.

40. The wireless terminal of claim 24, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a first fixed size and a second fixed size, reports of said second fixed size being larger than reports of said first fixed size;

and

wherein said reporting schedule information indicates more first size reports are to be transmitted than said second size reports for at least one iteration of a stored transmission report schedule.

41. The wireless terminal of claim 23, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a first fixed size and a second fixed size, reports of said second fixed size being larger than reports of said first fixed size wherein the smallest size report is used for highest priority traffic.

42. The wireless terminal of claim 41, wherein the first fixed size is one bit and wherein the one bit indicates the existence of information to be transmitted or lack thereof.

43. The wireless terminal of claim 42 wherein highest priority is voice or control traffic.

44. The wireless terminal of claim 24, wherein said transmission backlog reports report information on a plurality of queues, each report providing information on the backlog of one or more transmission request groups.

45. The wireless terminal claim 24, wherein said plurality of reports include reports of a first fixed size and a second fixed size;

wherein the first fixed size is one bit; and

wherein backlog information reports of the first size provide backlog information on the combined backlog corresponding to a plurality of different transmission queues.

46. The wireless of claim 45, wherein the second fixed size is 3 bits, wherein the third fixed size is 4 bits, and wherein the 3 bit report communicates a delta from a 4 bit report in at least some cases.

47. The wireless terminal of claim 24, wherein the second fixed size is 3 bits and wherein the 3 bit report provides information on two sets of queues.

48. The wireless terminal of claim 25, wherein the third fixed size is 4 bits, and wherein the 4 bit report provides information on one set of queues.

49. The wireless terminal of claim 41, wherein the one set of queues includes one request group queue, two request group queues, or three request group queues.

50. The wireless terminal of claim 26, wherein a dedicated control channel segment includes at most one of said first, second and third fixed size reports communicating transmit backlog information.

51. The wireless terminal of claim 26, wherein each dedicated control channel segment dedicated to the wireless terminal provides an opportunity for the wireless terminal to communicate one of said first, second, and third fixed size reports used to communicate transmit backlog information.

52. The wireless terminal of claim 26, wherein the wireless terminal includes a predetermined number of request group queues for uplink traffic and wherein the third fixed size report is capable of communicating backlog information corresponding to any of different request group queues.

34. The wireless terminal 33, wherein said report generation module includes an information grouping module for grouping status information corresponding to different sets of queues.

35. The wireless terminal of claim 34, wherein said grouping module supports different information groupings for reports of different bit sizes.