RE-ESTABLISHING WIRELESS COMMUNICATION SESSIONS

• US 20090116443A1
• Filed: 03/16/2007
• Published: 05/07/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 03/22/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: British Telecommunications PLC (BT Group PLC)
• Original Assignee: British Telecommunications PLC (BT Group PLC)
• Inventors: Evenden, Richard J, Farrow, Nicholas W, Scahill, Francis J, Turnbull, Rory S, Walker, Matthew D, Sim, Nicholas J
• Application Number:
  US12/293,892
• Publication Number:
  US 20090116443A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/329
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/1443 between licensed networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/302 due to low signal strength

Abstract

This invention relates to maintaining or re-establishing a communications session in a wireless communications system. The present invention provides a method of re-routing a call between a user device and a third party device, the method comprising: setting up a call with the third party device using a first wireless connection between the user device and an access point; monitoring a quality parameter of the first wireless connection at the access point; automatically re-routing the call from the third party device to the user via a second wireless connection between the user device and a base station in response to determining that the quality parameter of the first wireless connection has fallen below a predetermined threshold.

Claims

1. A method of re-routing a call between a user device and a third party device, the method comprising:

setting up a call with the third party device using a first wireless connection between the user device and an access point;

monitoring, at the access point, a quality parameter of the first wireless connection;

at the access point, automatically re-routing the call from the third party device to the user device via a second wireless connection between the user device and a base station in response to determining that the quality parameter of the first wireless connection has fallen below a predetermined threshold.

2. A method according to claim 1, wherein the automatic routing comprises the access point forwarding a re-routing message from the access point to a communications network entity which instructs re-routing of the call to the base station.

3. A method according to claim 2, wherein the quality parameter monitoring is performed in response to the access point determining that the call has been set-up.

4. A method according to claim 3 wherein the call set-up determination comprises identifying call set-up packets passed between the user device and the communications network identity

5. A method according to claim 1, further comprising mapping an identifier associated with the first wireless connection to an identifier associated with the second wireless connection in order to re-route the call using the second wireless connection identifier.

6. A method according to claim 1, wherein the first wireless connection is a Bluetooth or Wi-Fi connection, the second wireless connection is a cellular wireless connection, and the call is a VoIP call.

13. A carrier medium carrying processor code which when executed on a processor causes the processor to carry out a method according to claim 1.

7. An electronics device comprising:

a transceiver for providing a first wireless connection with an access point;

a second transceiver for providing a second wireless connection with a base station;

a mobile device client arranged to automatically receive a call on the second wireless connection whilst in the call on the first wireless connection with a third party device, the call being automatically received in response to receiving a call set-up request associated with the third party device over the second wireless connection.

8. A device according to claim 7, wherein the call set-up request comprises the third party device'"'"'s caller line identifier (CLI).

9. A device according to claim 7, wherein the mobile device client is further arranged to set-up the call on the first wireless connection with the third party, the call being a VoIP call.

10. An access point comprising:

a transceiver for providing a wireless connection with an electronics device;

means for connecting to a network in order to provide a communications path between the electronics device and the network;

means for monitoring a quality parameter of the wireless connection in response to determining a call has been placed between the electronics device and a third party device using the communications path;

means for sending a call re-routing request associated with the electronic device to the network in response to detecting that the quality parameter has fallen below a threshold.

11. An access point according to claim 10, wherein the quality parameter comprises a bit error rate (BER) level, and/or a signal strength metric.

12. An access point according to claim 10, wherein determination of a call being placed is by detecting a SIP packet on the communications path.