KEEP-ALIVE PACKET TRANSMISSION METHOD AND APPARATUS OF MOBILE TERMINAL

• US 20120170496A1
• Filed: 12/22/2011
• Published: 07/05/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/2010
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Inventors: YANG, Dong Jin, MOON, Yong Woon, CHAE, Hee Joon, YEON, Ji Hyun
• Application Number:
  US13/335,042
• Publication Number:
  US 20120170496A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/311
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0222 in packet switched networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0225 using monitoring of external events, e.g. the presence of a signal
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

A method and an apparatus for synchronizing the keep-alive packet transmission timings of the direct push applications are provided to improve an electric current consumption characteristic. The method includes detecting a network event, synchronizing transmission timings of keep-alive packets of direct push applications with reference to an occurrence time of the network event, and transmitting the keep-alive packets of the direct push application at a synchronized transmission timing simultaneously.

Claims

1. A keep-alive packet transmission method, the method comprising:

detecting a network event;

synchronizing transmission timings of keep-alive packets of direct push applications with reference to an occurrence time of the network event; and

transmitting the keep-alive packets of the direct push application at a synchronized transmission timing simultaneously.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the synchronizing comprises:

determining keep-alive packet transmission intervals of individual direct push applications;

selecting the direct push applications of which keep-alive packet transmission intervals fulfill a predefined condition; and

shifting the transmission timings of the selected direct push application to the occurrence time of the network event.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the network event comprises waking up a control unit of the mobile terminal to process a communication-related operation.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the network event comprises at least one of a communication event including an incoming call event, an outgoing call event, an incoming email event, an outgoing email event, an incoming message event, an outgoing message event, and an Internet browsing function execution event, and an application activation event for activating a specific direct push application to transmit the keep-alive packet at a transmission interval of the application.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein the direct push applications are configured with respective HeartBeat Intervals (HBIs) for transmitting the keep-alive packets.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the determining of the keep-alive packet transmission intervals comprises:

retrieving HBI information of each direct push application; and

identifying HBIs of the individual direct push applications.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the retrieving of the HBI information comprises selecting direct push applications of which a threshold value T, which is the difference between the occurrence time of the network event and a keep-alive packet transmission time of each of the direct push applications, is less than the HBI of the corresponding direct push application.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the retrieving of the HBI information comprises selecting the direct push application of which the threshold value T is less than

9. The method of claim 2, further comprising maintaining push sessions of the direct push applications with corresponding servers.

16. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed by a mobile terminal, cause the mobile terminal to perform the method of claim 1.

10. A mobile terminal comprising:

a communication module for maintaining a push session with at least one server and for transmitting keep-alive packets of direct push applications to the at least one server;

a storage unit for storing the direct push applications and HeartBeat Interval (HBI) information indicating transmission intervals of the direct push applications; and

a control unit for synchronizing transmission timings of the keep-alive packets of the direct push applications with reference to an occurrence time of a network event.

11. The mobile terminal of claim 10, wherein the control unit selects the direct push applications for fulfilling a predefined condition and for synchronizing keep-alive packet transmission timings of the direct push applications by shifting to the occurrence time of the network event.

12. The mobile terminal of claim 11, wherein the control unit determines a threshold value T, which is the difference between the occurrence time of the network event and a keep-alive packet transmission time of each of the direct push applications, and synchronizes the keep-alive packet transmission timing of the direct push application of which T is less than the HeartBeat Interval (HBI) of the corresponding application.

13. The mobile terminal of claim 12, wherein the network event comprises waking up the control unit of the mobile terminal to process a communication-related operation.

14. The mobile terminal of claim 13, wherein the network event comprises at least one of a communication event including an incoming call event, an outgoing call event, an incoming email event, an outgoing email event, an incoming message event, an outgoing message event, and an Internet browsing function execution event, and an application activation event for activating a specific direct push application to transmit the keep-alive packet at a transmission interval of the application.

15. The mobile terminal of claim 12, wherein the control unit synchronizes the keep-alive packet transmission timings of the direct push applications of which threshold value T is less than