METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR THE COMMON MANAGEMENT OF COMMUNICATION RESOURCES IN A TELECOMMUNICATIONS NETWORK HAVING DISTINCT COMMUNICATION RESOURCES POOLS

• US 20110082937A1
• Filed: 05/12/2008
• Published: 04/07/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 05/12/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Telecom Italia S.p.A.
• Original Assignee: Telecom Italia S.p.A.
• Inventors: Tosalli, Marco, Barbaresi, Andrea, Goria, Paolo
• Granted Patent: US 9,326,202 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/226
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/0083 Determination of parameters used for hand-off, e.g. generation or modification of neighbour cell lists
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/00837 Determination of triggering parameters for hand-off
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/14 Reselecting a network or an air interface
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/22 for handling the traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 48/18 Selecting a network or a communication service

Abstract

A method of providing, in a telecommunications network including at least a first and a second set of communication resources, a service to users in a condition of being provided said service both by the first set of communication resources and by the second set of communication resources. The method includes the steps of: upon receipt, through the first set of communication resources, of a service request related to the service from a user, attempting to redirect the service request to the second set of communication resources; and if the attempt succeeds, provisioning the service to the user by the second set of communication resources. The attempt to redirect the service request includes identifying a communication resource among the second set of communication resources, by either considering or not communication resources of the second set as candidates for the service request redirection based on a history criterion that takes into account an observation of the outcome of past redirection attempts.

Claims

1. A method of providing, in a telecommunications network including at least a first and a second set of communication resources, a service to users in a condition of being provided said service both by said first set of communication resources and by said second set of communication resources, the method including the steps of:

upon receipt, through said first set of communication resources, of a service request related to said service from a user, attempting to redirect the service request to the second set of communication resources; and

if the attempt succeeds, provisioning the service to the user by said second set of communication resources,

wherein said attempting to redirect the service request includes identifying a communication resource among said second set of communication resources, and said identifying a communication resource includes either considering or not communication resources of the second set as candidates for the service request redirection based on a history criterion that takes into account an observation of the outcome of past redirection attempts.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said identifying a communication resource among said second set of communication resources comprises not considering communication resources of the second set in respect of which a previous attempt of redirecting a service request thereto failed.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said attempting to redirect the service request includes one or more among:

assessing a type of the requested service;

assessing a load status of the first set of communication resources;

attempting to redirect the service request for every service request received after a predefined number of previous service requests.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein said not considering is limited to a time interval.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein said time interval is either fixed or dynamically variable, varied dynamically based on successes and failures of previous redirection attempts.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein said time interval is decreased when a redirection attempts succeeds, preferably not below a minimum value, and increased when a redirection attempt fails, preferably not above a maximum value.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising having the identified communication resource among said second set of communication resources accept or refuse the redirection attempt based on a current load status thereof.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein said communication resources of the first set and of the second set include one or more among:

radio resources belonging to different radio access technologies;

radio resources using different radio frequencies;

cells of cellular networks belonging to different hierarchical levels;

radio resources having a different radio resources control management;

radio resources corresponding to different and at least partially overlapped radio coverage areas obtainable by different beams of the same antenna or different antennas;

different logical transport links.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein said first set of communication resources and second set of communication resources include cells of a cellular network, and said identifying a communication resource among said second set of communication resources comprises selecting cellular network cells in the second set of communication resources that are in overlap with the cellular network cells of the first set of communication resources.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein said second set of communication resources includes radio communication resources, and said step of identifying a communication resource among said second set of communication resources comprises performing measurements on a radio quality of the communication resources of the second set, and not considering communications resources of the second set having a measured radio quality below a predetermined level.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein said step of attempting to redirect the service request to the second set of communication resources is performed before starting provisioning the service to the user.

14. A non-transitory computer readable medium having computer readable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one computer, perform the method steps of claim 1.

12. A communications resources controller for a telecommunications network including at least a first and a second set of communication resources and adapted to provide a service to users in a condition of being provided said service both by said first set of communication resources and by said second set of communication resources, the communications resources controller comprising:

a computing device; and

one or more computer readable media having stored thereon a service request redirection module, when executed by the computing device, attempting to redirect a service request, related to said service, to the second set of communication resources upon receipt, through said first set of communication resources, of the service request from a user, so that if the attempt succeeds, the service is provisioned to the user by said second set of communication resources,

wherein said service request redirection module includes a communication resources identification module that, when executed by the computing device, identifies a communication resource among said second set of communication resources, and either considers or not communication resources of the second set as candidates for the service request redirection based on a history criterion that takes into account an observation of the outcome of past redirection attempts.

13. A telecommunications network including at least a first and a second set of communication resources and adapted to provide a service to users in a condition of being provided said service both by said first set of communication resources and by said second set of communication resources, the telecommunications network comprising a communications resources controller according to claim 12.