Dynamic Load Balancing Under Partial Service Conditions

• US 20140185428A1
• Filed: 12/27/2012
• Published: 07/03/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 12/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ARRIS Enterprises LLC (CommScope Holding Company, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: General Instrument Corporation (CommScope Holding Company, Inc.)
• Inventors: Thibeault, Brian K., Carle, Andrew S., Mak, Sarah S.
• Granted Patent: US 9,203,639 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/225
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2863 Arrangements for combining access network resources elements, e.g. channel bonding modem pooling H04L25/14; routing of packets H04L45/00; multichannel or multilink protocols H04L69/14
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/08 Monitoring or testing based on specific metrics, e.g. QoS, energy consumption or environmental parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/12 Avoiding congestion; Recovering from congestion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/125 by balancing the load, e.g. traffic engineering
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0044 allocation of payload
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/50 in wire-line communication networks, e.g. low power modes or reduced link rate

Abstract

Methods and apparatuses for controlling load balancing of modems may include receiving an indication of impairment of a channel, placing modems using the impaired channel into a partial service mode and removing the impaired channel from a list of channels available for load balancing, monitoring the quality of the impaired channel, and, responsive to detection of acceptable quality on the impaired channel, removing the modems from partial service mode and adding the channel back to the list of channels available for load balancing. Another method includes, but is not limited to, receiving an indication of a partial service mode for a modem, incrementing a partial service mode counter for a channel associated with the partial service mode indication, computing a partial service mode metric based in part upon the partial service mode counter, and responsive to a determination that the partial service mode metric meets a threshold, determining an allocation of modems to channels.

Claims

1. A method of managing communication with a plurality of modems on a plurality of channels, said method comprising:

receiving an indication of impairment of a first channel of said plurality of channels;

responsive to said indication of impairment of said first channel, placing a subset of modems of said plurality of modems using said first channel into a partial service mode and removing said first channel from a list of channels available for load balancing;

monitoring a quality of said first channel; and

responsive to detection of acceptable quality on said first channel, removing said subset of modems of said plurality of modems from said partial service mode and adding said first channel to said list of channels available for load balancing.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising determining an allocation of said plurality of channels to said plurality of modems.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein said determining an allocation of said plurality of channels to said plurality of modems comprises substantially balancing one of:

the number of modems in communication on each channel or the utilization of each channel.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein placing said subset of modems of plurality of modems using said first channel into a partial service mode comprises sending a message to each modem in said subset.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein at least one modem of said plurality of modems communicates on at least two channels.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein at least one modem of said plurality of modems communicates on said first channel of said plurality of channels using one of a time division multiple access channel access method or a code division multiple access method.

7. A method of managing communication with a plurality of modems on a plurality of channels, said method comprising:

receiving an indication of a partial service mode for a first modem of said plurality of modems;

responsive to said indication of a partial service mode for said first modem, incrementing a first partial service mode counter for a first channel of said plurality of channels associated with said partial service mode indication;

computing a first partial service mode metric based in part upon said first partial service mode counter; and

responsive to a determination that said first partial service mode metric meets a threshold, determining an allocation of said plurality of modems to said plurality of channels, including said first channel.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein computing a first partial service mode metric is performed responsive to detecting a trigger condition for load balancing of said plurality of modems.

9. The method of claim 7 wherein said first modem communicates on said first channel of said plurality of channels using one of a time division multiple access channel access method or a code division multiple access method.

10. The method of claim 7 wherein said first partial service mode metric meeting said threshold comprises a difference between the first partial service mode metric associated with a first channel and a second partial service mode metric associated with a second channel being above a predetermined threshold.

11. The method of claim 7 wherein said first partial service mode metric meeting said threshold comprises a difference between a first modem count, comprising a sum of a count of active modems associated with said first channel and said first partial service mode counter for said first channel, and a second modem count, exceeding a predetermined threshold.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein said second modem count is one of:

a count of active and partial service mode modems associated with a second channel, an average of a plurality of counts active and partial service mode modems associated with two or more of said plurality of channels, or a minimum count of active and partial service mode modems associated with said plurality of channels.

13. The method of claim 11 wherein said second modem count comprises modems in partial service mode.

14. The method of claim 7 wherein at least one modem of said plurality of modems communicates on at least two channels.

15. The method of claim 7 wherein said determining an allocation of said plurality of channels to said plurality of modems comprises substantially balancing one of:

the number of modems in communication on each channel or the data utilization of each channel.

16. The method of claim 7 wherein said partial service mode metric is a percentage of modems associated with said first channel that are in a partial service mode.

17. The method of claim 16 wherein said partial service mode metric meeting said threshold comprises said percentage of modems associated with said first channel that are in a partial service mode being below a predetermined percentage or said percentage of modems associated with said first channel that are not in a partial service mode being above a predetermined percentage.

18. The method of claim 17 wherein said predetermined percentage is between 5% and 15%.

19. An apparatus for communicating with a plurality of modems on a plurality of channels comprising:

a plurality of receivers for receiving data transmitted from said plurality of modems on said plurality of channels or a plurality of transmitters for transmitting data to said plurality of modems on said plurality of channels;

a memory for storing a list of channels available for load balancing; and

a processor for;

receiving an indication of impairment of a first channel of said plurality of channels;

responsive to said indication of impairment of said channel, placing those modems of said plurality of modems using said channel into a partial service mode and removing said channel from the list of channels available for load balancing;

monitoring the quality of the impaired channel; and

responsive to detection of acceptable quality on the impaired channel, removing said modems of said plurality of modems from a partial service mode and adding the channel to the list of channels available for load balancing.

20. The apparatus of claim 19 wherein said processor is further configured to generate an allocation of said plurality of channels to said plurality of modems.