Wireless slave unit

• US 20090161600A1
• Filed: 06/13/2006
• Published: 06/25/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 06/16/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Panasonic Corporation (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Panasonic Corporation (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Ohta, Yoshitaka, Nakae, Hironori, Hamamoto, Yasuo, Hayashino, Hiroshi, Ukita, Yosuke, Sato, Shuichi, Ohta, Kazuhiro
• Granted Patent: US 8,588,131 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/328
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/06 Optimizing the usage of the radio link, e.g. header compression, information sizing , discarding information system modifying transmission characteristic according to link quality by modifying frame length H04L1/0007; dynamic adaptation of the packet size for flow control or congestion control H04L47/365
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 68/00 User notification, e.g. alerting and paging, for incoming communication, change of service or the like
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/26 Network addressing or numbering for mobility support
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/22 with access to wired networks

Abstract

In a network area of a wireless network managed by a wireless master device, a wireless slave device performs wireless network communication with another wireless slave device connected by wire to a terminal, and wired network communication with a terminal connected by wire to the wireless slave device. The wireless slave device includes a wireless reception unit (121) that wirelessly receives a notification frame including a MAC address of the terminal connected by wire to the other wireless slave device and a MAC address of the other wireless slave device, a storage unit (112) that associates and stores the MAC address of the other wireless slave device and the MAC address of the terminal both included in the wirelessly received notification frame, a wire reception unit (120) that receives a frame transmitted from the terminal connected by wire to the wireless slave device, and a filtering unit (111) that discards the frame if the transmission destination MAC address of the frame received by wire does not match the MAC address stored in the storage unit.

Claims

1. A wireless slave device for performing, in a network area of a wireless network managed by a wireless master device, wired network communication with one or more terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, and wireless network communication with another wireless slave device connected by wire to one or more other terminals, the wireless slave device comprising:

a wireless reception unit operable to wirelessly receive a notification frame that includes a respective MAC address of each of the one or more other terminals;

a storage unit operable to store the MAC addresses of the one or more other terminals, which are included in the wirelessly received notification frame;

a wire reception unit operable to receive by wire a frame that includes a transmission destination MAC address and has been transmitted from one of the terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device; and

a filtering unit operable to discard the frame if the transmission destination MAC address in the frame received by wire does not match any of the MAC addresses stored in the storage unit.

2. The wireless slave device of claim 1, further comprising:

a first control unit operable to, in accordance with a notification frame newly wirelessly received by the wireless reception unit, update the MAC addresses stored in the storage unit;

a second storage unit operable to store a MAC address of one of the terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, which is included in the frame that the wire reception unit received by wire;

a second control unit operable to, in accordance with a predetermined condition, delete the MAC address stored in the second storage unit;

a notification frame creation unit operable, if the MAC address has been deleted from the second storage unit, or if a MAC address has been newly stored in the second storage unit, to create a notification frame including all of the MAC addresses currently stored in the second storage unit; and

a wireless transmission unit operable to wirelessly transmit the created notification frame to the other wireless slave device.

3. The wireless slave device of claim 1, further comprising:

a request frame creation unit operable to create a request frame for requesting the other wireless slave device to transmit the notification frame; and

a wireless transmission unit operable to wirelessly transmit the created request frame to the other wireless slave device, wherein

the wireless reception unit wirelessly receives the notification frame wirelessly transmitted from the other wireless slave device according to the wirelessly transmitted request frame.

4. The wireless slave device of claim 3, wherein

the request frame creation unit creates the request frame addressed to the other wireless slave device after a predetermined time period has elapsed from the wireless reception unit wirelessly receiving the notification frame wirelessly transmitted from the other wireless slave device.

5. The wireless slave device of claim 3, wherein

the wireless reception unit wirelessly receives the request frame wirelessly transmitted from the other wireless slave device, and

the wireless slave, device further comprises:

a second storage unit operable to store a MAC address of one of the terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, which is included in the frame that the wire reception unit received by wire; and

a notification frame creation unit operable, if the request frame is wirelessly received, to create a notification frame including all of the MAC address stored in the second storage unit.

6. The wireless slave device of claim 1, wherein

the notification frame wirelessly received by the wireless reception unit is an ARP packet having been attached with attachment information that includes the MAC addresses of the one or more other terminals connected by wire to the other wireless slave device.

7. The wireless slave device of claim 6, wherein

the wire reception unit receives by wire an ARP packet that has been transmitted from one of the terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device and is addressed to one of the other terminals connected by wire to the other wireless slave device, and

the wireless slave device further comprises:

an attaching unit operable to attach, to the ARP packet, attachment information including all of the MAC addresses stored in the second storage unit; and

a wireless transmission unit operable to wirelessly transmit the ARP packet having been attached with the attachment information.

8. The wireless slave device of claim 7, wherein

the wireless network managed by the wireless master device conforms to IEEE 802.11e standards, and

the wireless slave device further comprises:

a setting unit operable, if the transmission destination MAC address in the frame that the wire reception unit received by wire matches any of the MAC addresses stored in the storage unit, to perform setting for direct wireless communication between the wireless slave device and the other wireless slave device without involving the wireless master device.

9. A wireless slave device for performing, in a network area of a wireless network managed by a wireless master device, wired network communication with one or more terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, and wireless network communication with another wireless slave device connected by wire to one or more other terminals, the wireless slave device comprising:

a wireless reception unit operable to wirelessly receive a notification frame that includes a respective MAC address of each of the one or more terminals that has been disconnected from the other wireless slave device after having been connected thereto by wire;

a storage unit operable to store the MAC addresses included in the wirelessly received notification frame;

a wire reception unit operable to receive by wire a frame that has been transmitted from one of the terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device and includes a transmission destination MAC address; and

a filtering unit operable to discard the frame if the transmission destination MAC address in the frame received by wire matches any of the MAC addresses stored in the storage unit.

10. The wireless slave device of claim 9, further comprising:

a second storage unit operable to store a respective MAC address of each of the one or more terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, which are included in the frame that the wire reception unit received by wire;

a detection unit operable to detect that one or more of the terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device has been disconnected;

a notification frame creation unit operable to create a notification frame that includes, from among the MAC addresses stored in the second storage unit, the MAC address of the one or more terminals whose disconnection has been detected by the detection unit; and

a wireless transmission unit operable to wirelessly transmit the created notification frame to the other wireless slave device.