MULTI-CHANNEL SINGLE RADIO COMMUNICATION IN HOME MESH NETWORK

• US 20100232369A1
• Filed: 03/11/2009
• Published: 09/16/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/11/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.), Sony Electronics Inc. (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.), Sony Electronics Inc. (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Liu, Aixin, Patil, Abhishek, Nguyen, Djung N., Jing, Xiangpeng
• Granted Patent: US 8,861,445 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/329
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/52 based on load
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/085 collision avoidance
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks

Abstract

An embodiment is a technique to use a single radio for multi-channel wireless communication. A local device having a local channel table operates on a common channel in a multi-channel wireless network having a plurality of network devices to perform management, control, and discovery functions using a single radio. A data session channel is negotiated with a remote device having a remote channel table upon an initiation of a communication session using the local and remote channel tables on the common channel. Data packets are exchanged with the remote device using the data session channel in a data transmission mode.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

operating on a common channel in a multi-channel wireless network having a plurality of network devices to perform management, control, and discovery functions using a single radio in a local device having a local channel table;

negotiating a data session channel with a remote device having a remote channel table upon an initiation of a communication session using the local and remote channel tables on the common channel; and

exchanging data packets with the remote device using the data session channel in a data transmission mode.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein operating on the common channel comprises:

performing a management operation being at least one of beaconing, association, and authentication operations;

sending a routing message;

exchanging special messages having information on traffic flow and channel selection with network devices; and

forming the local channel table containing information on active channels in the multi-channel wireless mesh network.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein forming the local channel table comprises:

gathering the information on the active channels from the special messages; and

sorting the active channels in terms of an availability criterion using the gathered information.

4. The method of claim 2 wherein negotiating comprises:

sending the local channel table to the remote device;

receiving the remote channel table from the remote device;

selecting a most available channel common to the local data channel and the remote channel table;

confirming the most available channel being the data session channel; and

announcing use of the data session channel.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein exchanging data comprises:

switching the single radio to the data session channel; and

exchanging packets of the data with the remote device.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

releasing the data session channel after the data transmission mode is terminated.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein releasing the data session channel comprises:

switching the single radio from the data session channel;

returning to the common channel; and

announcing release of the data session channel.

8. The method of claim 4 wherein negotiating further comprises:

negotiating a sub-optimal channel or backing off traffic to wait for an available channel if there is no vacant channel.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the data session channel is extended from the common channel to accommodate a non-mesh device.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the multi-channel wireless network conforms to an 802.11 standard.

11. An article of manufacture comprising:

a machine-accessible storage medium including data that, when accessed by a machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising;

operating on a common channel in a multi-channel wireless network having a plurality of network devices to perform management, control, and discovery functions using a single radio in a local device having a local channel table;

negotiating a data session channel with a remote device having a remote channel table upon an initiation of a communication session using the local and remote channel tables on the common channel; and

exchanging data packets with the remote device using the data session channel in a data transmission mode.

12. The article of manufacture of claim 11 wherein the data causing the machine to perform operating on the common channel comprise data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

performing a management operation being at least one of beaconing, association, and authentication operations;

sending a routing message;

exchanging special messages having information on traffic flow and channel selection with network devices; and

forming the local channel table containing information on active channels in the multi-channel wireless mesh network.

13. The article of manufacture of claim 12 wherein the data causing the machine to perform forming the local channel table comprise data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

gathering the information on the active channels from the special messages; and

sorting the active channels in terms of an availability criterion using the gathered information.

14. The article of manufacture of claim 12 wherein the data causing the machine to perform negotiating comprise data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

sending the local channel table to the remote device;

receiving the remote channel table from the remote device;

selecting a most available channel common to the local data channel and the remote channel table;

confirming the most available channel being the data session channel; and

announcing use of the data session channel.

15. The article of manufacture of claim 11 wherein the data causing the machine to perform exchanging data comprise data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

switching the single radio to the data session channel; and

exchanging packets of the data with the remote device.

16. The article of manufacture of claim 11 further comprising data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

releasing the data session channel after the data transmission mode is terminated.

17. The article of manufacture of claim 16 wherein the data causing the machine to perform releasing the data session channel comprise data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

switching the single radio from the data session channel;

returning to the common channel; and

announcing release of the data session channel.

18. The article of manufacture of claim 14 wherein the data causing the machine to perform negotiating further comprise data that, when accessed by the machine, cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

negotiating a sub-optimal channel or backing off traffic to wait for an available channel if there is no vacant channel.

19. The article of manufacture of claim 11 wherein the data session channel is extended from the common channel to accommodate the non-mesh device.

20. The article of manufacture of claim 11 wherein the multi-channel wireless network conforms to an 802.11 standard.

21. An apparatus comprising:

a radio frequency (RF) tunable antenna;

a single radio transceiver interface operating at a radio frequency to communicate with a plurality of network devices in a multi-channel wireless network; and

a processing module coupled to the single radio transceiver interface, the processing module comprising;

a local channel table;

an operation module to perform management, control, and discovery functions,

a negotiation module coupled to the operation module to negotiate a data session channel with a remote device having a remote channel table upon an initiation of a communication session using the local and remote channel tables on the common channel, and

a session module coupled to the negotiation module to exchange data packets with the remote device using the data session channel in a data transmission mode.

22. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein the operation module on the common channel performs operations comprising:

performing a management operation being at least one of beaconing, association, and authentication operations;

sending a routing message;

exchanging special messages having information on traffic flow and channel selection with network devices; and

forming the local channel table containing information on active channels in the multi-channel wireless mesh network.

23. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein the operation module forming the local channel table by operations comprising:

gathering the information on the active channels from the special messages; and

sorting the active channels in terms of an availability criterion using the gathered information.

24. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein the negotiation module negotiates a data session channel by operations comprising:

sending the local channel table to the remote device;

receiving the remote channel table from the remote device;

selecting a most available channel common to the local data channel and the remote channel table;

confirming the most available channel being the data session channel; and

announcing use of the data session channel.

25. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein session module performs exchanging data by operations comprising:

switching the single radio to the data session channel; and

exchanging packets of the data with the remote device.

26. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein the processing module further comprises:

a control module to release the data session channel after the data transmission mode is terminated.

27. The apparatus of claim 26 wherein the control module releases the data session channel by operations comprising:

switching the single radio from the data session channel;

returning to the common channel; and

announcing release of the data session channel.

28. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein the negotiation module further performs operations comprising:

negotiating a sub-optimal channel or backing off traffic to wait for an available channel if there is no vacant channel.

29. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein the data session channel is extended from the common channel to accommodate a non-mesh device.

30. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein the multi-channel wireless network conforms to an 802.11 standard.