AIRCRAFT DATA SERVICES

• US 20120303826A1
• Filed: 07/26/2012
• Published: 11/29/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 05/14/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Wireless Services Incorporated (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Nelson, Eric A., O'Meara, Michael B.
• Granted Patent: US 8,578,037 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/228
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/18506 Communications with or from aircraft, i.e. aeronautical mobile service
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/18508 with satellite system used as relay, i.e. aeronautical mobile satellite service
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/02 Hierarchically pre-organised networks, e.g. paging networks, cellular networks, WLAN [Wireless Local Area Network] or WLL [Wireless Local Loop]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/06 Airborne or Satellite Networks space-based or airborne stations H04B7/185

Abstract

A method and system provide efficient, flexible, and convenient data communication services over public wireless systems. The system includes a data communication server, having a plurality of interface units, for facilitating data communication between a moving object and one or more ground terminals via a radio communication path. The data communication server establishes the radio communication path over one of a plurality of wireless data networks including packet data networks and satellite data networks and preferably includes a pre-determined software architecture.

Claims

1. A processor readable storage medium that is not a transient signal per se, the processor readable storage medium having stored thereon executable instruction that when executed by a processor perform operations comprising:

initiating a radio communication path via system resources layer components that communicate with systems services layer components, the system resources layer components including a device driver for data exchange between a moving object and a first ground station, wherein the system services layer components provide system level services to objects of an application programming interface layer;

initiating a connection between the first ground station and a second ground station;

transmitting data including operational data of the moving object using system services layer components from the moving object to the first ground station via the radio communication path; and

facilitating transmission of data from the first ground station to the second ground station via the connection between the first ground station and the second ground station.

2. The processor readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the connection between the first ground station and the second ground station is formed at least in part by a public switched telephone network.

3. The processor readable storage medium of claim 1, further comprising initiating an end-to-end link layer connection between the communication server and a terminal node.

4. The processor readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein data packets are modulated onto a radio frequency and sent to the first ground station via the radio communication path.

5. The processor readable storage medium of claim 4, wherein the data packets are sent from the first ground station to the second ground station via a frame relay network.

6. The processor readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein a point-to-point protocol frame is tunneled from the communication server to the second ground station via a layer two tunneling protocol.

7. A processor readable storage medium that is not a transient signal per se, the processor readable storage medium having stored thereon executable instructions that when executed by a processor perform operations comprising:

from an aircraft communications server, transmitting data packets comprising data related to operational data of an aircraft from an application of an applications layer of a software architecture implemented on the aircraft communications server according to a point-to-point protocol to a ground-based network, wherein the transmitting comprises transmission via multiple radio links, and wherein a point-to-point protocol frame is tunneled from the aircraft communications server to a ground data gateway via a tunneling protocol; and

receiving data packets at the aircraft communications server via a satellite uplink according to access controls provided by system services layer components according to the software architecture, wherein the system services layer components exchange data with onboard aircraft avionics using a device driver.

8. The processor readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein the ground-based network includes a North American Terrestrial System network.

9. The processor readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein the ground-based network includes the Internet.

10. The processor readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein the aircraft communications server includes object-oriented software.

11. A system comprising:

memory having stored thereon executable instructions; and

a processor coupled to the memory, the processor configured to execute the executable instructions to perform operations comprising;

initiating a radio communication path via system resources layer components that communicate with systems services layer components, the system resources layer components including a device driver for data exchange between a moving object and a first ground station, wherein the system services layer components provide system level services to objects of an application programming interface layer;

initiating a connection between the first ground station and a second ground station;

transmitting data including operational data of the moving object using system services layer components from the moving object to the first ground station via the radio communication path; and

facilitating transmission of data from the first ground station to the second ground station via the connection between the first ground station and the second ground station.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the connection between the first ground station and the second ground station is formed at least in part by a public switched telephone network.

13. The system of claim 11, further comprising initiating an end-to-end link layer connection between the communication server and a terminal node.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein data packets are modulated onto a radio frequency and sent to the first ground station via the radio communication path.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the data packets are sent from the first ground station to the second ground station via a frame relay network.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein a point-to-point protocol frame is tunneled from the communication server to the second ground station via a layer two tunneling protocol.