METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SOFT BUFFER PROCESSING

• US 20130070652A1
• Filed: 09/19/2012
• Published: 03/21/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/20/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Inventors: LI, Yingyang, SUN, Chengjun
• Granted Patent: US 9,800,375 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/280
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1819 with retransmission of additional or different redundancy
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1822 involving configuration of automatic repeat request [ARQ] with parallel processes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1835 Buffer management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1854 Scheduling and prioritising arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/001 the frequencies being arranged in component carriers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0023 Time-frequency-space
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0055 Physical resource allocation for ACK/NACK for physical mapping arrangements in ARQ protocols H04L1/1861
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/1469 using time-sharing

Abstract

A network side equipment, a user equipment, and a method for soft buffer processing are provided. The method includes allocating, by a base station, transmission resource for a User Equipment (UE), and processing a soft buffer according to at least one parameter of the soft buffer, when uplink and downlink configurations of a plurality of cells of the UE Carrier Aggregation (CA) are different, sending, by the base station, data to the UE by a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) and a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH), wherein the at least one parameter of soft buffer is determined by at least one of a Primary cell (Pcell) and a Secondary cell (Scell) uplink and downlink configurations of the UE, and wherein rate matching is performed on the PDSCH.

Claims

1. A method for soft buffer processing, the method comprising:

allocating, by a base station, a transmission resource for a User Equipment (UE), and processing a soft buffer according to at least one parameter of the soft buffer, when uplink and downlink configurations of a plurality of Cells of the UE Carrier Aggregation (CA) are different; and

sending, by the base station, data to the UE by a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) and a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH),

wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is determined by at least one of a Primary cell (Pcell) and a Secondary cell (Scell) uplink and downlink configurations of the UE, and

wherein rate matching is performed on the PDSCH.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is an actual maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes of each Cell based on which the soft buffer is processed.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of uplink and downlink configuration of the at least one of the Scell and the Pcell, as defined in Release 10 of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Time Division Duplex (TDD), based on which the soft buffer is processed.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a predefined fixed value of a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes based on which the soft buffer is processed.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the predefined fixed value is 8.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a greater value of a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of respective uplink and downlink configurations of the Pcell and the Scell, as defined in Release 8 of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Time Division Duplex (TDD), based on which the soft buffer is processed.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of TDD uplink and downlink configurations, for determining Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request-ACKnowledgement (HARQ-ACK) timing relation, based on which the soft buffer is processed.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is M_DL—

_HARQ^max, where M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max is obtained by calculation based on a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of or TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request-ACKnowledgement (HARQ-ACK) timing relation,

wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref, and in other cases, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref−

1.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein parameters of the soft buffer are a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M_DL—

_HARQ^ref of TDD uplink and downlink configurations, for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation and the cap parameter M_limit^ref of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes after change, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a subset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, wherein the downlink subframe of the Scell is neither the subset of nor the superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and wherein, when the uplink and downlink configurations of the Scell is 0 or 6, M_limit^ref=7, otherwise, M_limit^ref=8.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein parameters of the soft buffer are M_DL—

_HARQ^max and M_limit^ref, wherein M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max is obtained by calculation based on a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of TDD uplink and downlink configurations, for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref, and in other cases, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref−

1, and wherein M_limit^ref is obtained in a M_limit^ref process comprising;

in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a subset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and that the downlink subframe of the Scell is neither the subset of nor the superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and when the uplink and downlink configurations of Scell is 0 or 6, M_limit^ref=7, otherwise, M_limit^ref=8.

11. A method for soft buffer processing, the method comprising:

receiving, by a User Equipment (UE), transmission resource information that a base station allocates for it, and processing a soft buffer according to at least one parameter of the soft buffer when uplink and downlink configurations of a plurality of Cells of the UE carrier aggregation are different; and

receiving, by the UE, Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) and physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) sent by the base station, according to the transmission resource and the at least one parameter of the soft buffer,

wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is determined by at least one of a Primary cell (Pcell) and a Secondary cell (Scell) uplink and downlink configurations of the UE.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is an actual maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes of each Cell, based on which the soft buffer is processed.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes defined by the uplink and downlink configurations of the at least one of the Scell and the Pcell, as defined in Release 10 of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Time Division Duplex (TDD), based on which the soft buffer is processed.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a predefined fixed value of a maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes, based on which the soft buffer is processed.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the predefined fixed value is 8.

16. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a greater value of a maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes of respective uplink and downlink configurations of the Pcell and the Scell, as defined in Release 8 of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Time Division Duplex (TDD), based on which the soft buffer is processed.

17. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes of Time Division Duplex (TDD) uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACKnowledgement (ACK) timing relation, based on which the soft buffer is processed.

18. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is M_DL—

_HARQ^max, where M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max is obtained by calculation based on a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of Time Division Duplex (TDD) uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref, and in other cases, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref−

1.

19. The method of claim 11, wherein parameters of the soft buffer are a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M_DL—

_HARQ^ref of Time Division Duplex (TDD) uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation and the cap parameter M_limit^ref of a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes after change, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a subset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, wherein the downlink subframe of the Scell is neither the subset of nor the superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and wherein, when the uplink and downlink configurations of the Scell is 0 or 6, M_limit^ref=7, otherwise, M_limit^ref=8.

20. The method of claim 11, wherein parameters of the soft buffer are M_DL—

_HARQ and M_limit^ref, wherein M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max is obtained by calculation based on a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of Time Division Duplex (TDD) uplink and downlink configurations for determining Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request-ACKnowledgement (HARQ-ACK) timing relation, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^MAX equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref, and in other cases, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref−

1, and M_limit^ref is obtained in a M_limit^ref process comprising;

in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a subset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and that the downlink subframe of the Scell is neither the subset of nor the superset of downlink subframes of Pcell, and when the uplink and downlink configurations of the Scell is 0 or 6, M_limit^ref=7, otherwise, M_limit^ref=8.

21. A base station comprising:

a resource management module for allocating a transmission resource for a User Equipment (UE), and for processing a soft buffer according to at least one parameter of the soft buffer when uplink and downlink configurations of a plurality of Cells of the UE Carrier Aggregation (CA) are different, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is determined by at least one of a Pcell and a Scell uplink and downlink configurations of the UE; and

a sending module for performing rate matching on Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) and for sending data to the UE by Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) and the PDSCH.

22. The base station of claim 21, wherein a selection of the at least one parameter of the soft buffer includes a selection process comprising one or more of:

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is an actual maximum number of downlink Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) processes of each Cell based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes defined by the uplink and downlink configurations of the at least one of the Scell and the Pcell, as defined in Release 10 of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Time Division Duplex (TDD), based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a predefined fixed value of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a greater value of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of respective uplink and downlink configurations of the Pcell and the Scell, as defined in Release 8 of LTE TDD, based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max, wherein M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max is obtained by calculation based on the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of Scell is a superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref, and in other cases, equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref−

1;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation and the cap parameter M_limit^ref of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes after change, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a subset of downlink subframes of Pcell, wherein the downlink subframe of the Scell is neither the subset of nor the superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and wherein, when the uplink and downlink configurations of the Scell is 0 or 6, M_limit^ref=7, otherwise, M_limit^ref=8; and

wherein parameters of the soft buffer are and M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max and M_limit^ref.

23. A User Equipment (UE) comprising:

a resource management module for determining transmission resource information that a base station allocates for it, and for processing a soft buffer according to at least one parameter of the soft buffer when uplink and downlink configurations of a plurality of Cells of the UE carrier aggregation are different, wherein the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is determined by at least one of a Pcell and a Scell uplink and downlink configurations of the UE; and

a receiving module for receiving a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) and a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) sent by the base station, according to the transmission resource and the at least one parameter of processing the soft buffer.

24. The UE according to claim 23, wherein a selection of the at least one parameter of the soft buffer includes a selection process comprising one or more of:

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is an actual maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of each Cell based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a maximum number of downlink HARQ processes defined by the uplink and downlink configurations of the at least one of the Scell and the Pcell, as defined in Release 10 of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Time Division Duplex (TDD), based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a predefined fixed value of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is a greater value of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of respective uplink and downlink configurations of the Pcell and Scell, as defined in Release 8 of LTE TDD, based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes of TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation based on which the soft buffer is processed;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max, wherein M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max is obtained by calculation based on the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation;

in a case where the downlink subframe of Scell is a superset of downlink subframes of Pcell, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref, and in other cases, M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max equals to M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref−

1;

the at least one parameter of the soft buffer is the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^ref of TDD uplink and downlink configurations for determining HARQ-ACK timing relation and the cap parameter M_limit^ref of the maximum number of downlink HARQ processes after change, wherein in a case where the downlink subframe of the Scell is a subset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and that the downlink subframe of the Scell is neither the subset of nor the superset of downlink subframes of the Pcell, and when the uplink and downlink configurations of Scell is 0 or 6, M_limit^ref=7, otherwise, M_limit^ref=8; and

parameters of the soft buffer are and M<sub>DL—

HARQ</sub>^max and M_limit^ref.