LOCATION-BASED IMS SERVER SELECTION

• US 20100208648A1
• Filed: 02/17/2009
• Published: 08/19/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 02/17/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: T-Mobile USA, Inc. (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Original Assignee: T-Mobile USA, Inc. (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Inventors: Narkar, Vishal Ashok, Shah, Mehul Jayant
• Granted Patent: US 9,036,541 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/328
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/487 using geographical or spatial information, e.g. location
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/69 using geographic information, e.g. room number
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/5007 Internet protocol [IP] addresses
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1016 IP multimedia subsystem [IMS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1073 Registration or de-registration
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1001 for accessing one among a plurality of replicated servers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1021 based on client or server locations
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 80/10 adapted for application session management, e.g. SIP [Session Initiation Protocol] connection management H04W76/00; arrangements for session management H04L67/14

Abstract

A user location is estimated based on an IP address assigned to the user'"'"'s device/equipment during registration for multimedia application services that are provided over the IP multimedia subsystems (IMS) network. The latitude and longitude information of the user location is obtained based on the IP address assigned to the user device/equipment. Such information is used to determine an appropriate server(s) for establishing an IP multimedia service session. In some embodiments, a closely located IMS server(s) is selected for proxying, interrogating, providing or delivering IP multimedia services. In this manner, each user device/equipment communicates with IMS servers that are located close to the user and thus, the geographically distributed load among the IMS gateway servers can be achieved.

Claims

1. A system for providing IP multimedia services, the system comprising:

a location server for providing geographic information associated with an IP address; and

one or more IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) servers for providing IP multimedia services, each IMS server configured to;

transmit a query to the location server in order to obtain geographic information about the user device, the query including an IP address of the user device, the user device initiating a request for an IP multimedia service;

receive a response to the query, the response including the geographic information about the user device;

identify a region that corresponds to the geographic information about the user device; and

select a destination server that resides within the identified region.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein if there are a plurality of destination servers that reside within the identified region, the IMS server selects, among the plurality of destination servers, one destination server that is located close to the user device.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the IMS server is a proxy IMS server and the destination server is an interrogating server.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the user device discovers the proxy IMS server through an access gateway server.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the access gateway server is configured to:

receive the geographic information associated with the IP address of the user device;

identify a matching region based on the geographic information about the user device; and

select a proxy IMS server that is located close to the user device within the matching region.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the IMS server is an interrogating IMS server and the destination server is a serving IMS server having a capability of providing the requested IP multimedia service

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the IThS server is a home subscriber server (HSS) and the destination server is a serving IMS server having a capability to provide the requested IP multimedia service.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein a location server provides the longitude and latitude values associated with the IP address of the user device.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the region represents a geographical area defined by boundary information.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the boundary information includes maximum and minimum values of latitude and longitude.

11. A computer-implemented method for selecting a destination server in establishing an IP multimedia service session for a user device, the computer-implemented method comprising:

obtaining registration information initiating an IP multimedia service;

obtaining geographic information about the user device;

determining a matching region based on the geographic information about the user device;

selecting a destination server that is located close to the user device in the matching region; and

forwarding the registration information to the destination server.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the geographic information includes longitude and latitude values associated with an IP address of the user device, the longitude and latitude values provided from a location server.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 12, wherein the region represents a geographical area defined by boundary information.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the boundary information includes maximum and minimum values of latitude and longitude.

15. The computer-implemented method of claim 14, wherein determining a matching region includes identifying a region that includes a location represented by the longitude and latitude values associated with the IP address of the user device.

16. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the destination server is a proxy IMS server that is configured to select an interrogating IMS server for the user device.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the destination server is an interrogating IMS server that is configured to select a serving IMS server for the user device.

18. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the interrogating IMS server communicates with a home subscriber server (HSS) that is configured to:

determine a matching region based on the geographic information about the user device;

select a serving IMS server having a capability with respect to the initiated IP multimedia service, the serving IMS server based on the matching region; and

return the selected serving IMS server information to the interrogating IMS server.

19. The computer implemented method of claim 18, wherein the selected serving IMS server communicates with IP multimedia application servers to deliver the IP multimedia services to the user device.

20. A server for providing IP multimedia services, the server configured to:

obtain an IP address of a user device that initiates a request for an IP multimedia service;

determine geographic information associated with the IP address;

identify a matching region based on the determined geographic information about the user device;

select a destination server that is located close to the user device within the matching region; and

forward information related to the request to the selected destination server.

21. The server of claim 20, further configured to:

transmit a query to a location server in order to obtain the geographic information about the user device, the query including an IP address of the user device; and

receive a response to the query, the response including the geographic information about the user device.

22. The server of claim 20, wherein if the destination server is a proxy IMS server, a table representing a relationship between a region and one or more proxy IMS servers is used.

23. The server of claim 20, wherein if the destination server is an interrogating IMS server, a table representing a relationship between a region and one or more Interrogating IMS servers is used.

24. The server of claim 20, wherein if the destination server is a serving IMS server, a table representing a relationship between a region and a serving IMS server along with a capability of the serving IMS server is used.

26. The server of claim 20, wherein a region represents a geographical area that is a portion of a service area, the geographical area being defined by boundary information that includes maximum and minimum values of latitude and longitude of the geographical area.

25. The server of claim 25, wherein a region is associated with one serving IMS server that has a physical presence within the region.

27. A computer-readable medium having instructions encoded thereon to select a server of IP multimedia services based on the geographic location of a user device, wherein the instructions, when executed by a computing device, cause the computing device to:

obtain an IP address of a user device;

transmit a query to a location server, requesting geographic location information about the user device, the query including the IP address of the user device;

receive, from the location server, a response to the query, the response including the geographic location information that corresponds to the IP address of the user device;

determine an IMS server that is located close to a user'"'"'s current location, the user'"'"'s current location estimated by the geographic location information; and

forward registration information to allow the user device to establish an IP multimedia service session with the IMS server.

28. The computer-readable medium of claim 27, wherein the registration information is received from the user device initiating a request for an IP multimedia service.

29. The computer-readable medium of claim 27, wherein the geographic location information about the user device includes longitude and latitude values associated with the IP address of the user device.

30. The computer-readable medium of claim 29, wherein a service area for the IP multimedia service is divided into a plurality of regions, each region including at least one IMS server.

31. The computer-readable medium of claim 30, wherein the instructions cause the computing device to identify a region which encompasses the user'"'"'s current location.

32. The computer-readable medium of claim 31, wherein the instructions cause the computing device to:

obtain boundary information of each region;

compare the longitude and latitude values with the boundary information of each region; and

wherein the identified region has boundary information that encompasses the longitude and latitude values.