Method and apparatus for permitting radio unit roaming between trunked RF transmission sites over a wide area that encompasses plural multisite networks
First Claim
1. A trunked communications system in which portable/mobile radio units roam from one geographical area to another over a wide area communications network, comprising:
- plural trunked rf repeater site controllers located in associated geographical areas for coordinating rf communications with radio units within or near the associated areas, each radio unit selecting one of the site controllers through for conducting communications over the wide area network;
plural digital switches including a local switch and a remote switch, each digital switch including;
a first bus for conveying digital audio information during preassigned time slots to interface modules connected to the first bus;
a second bus for conveying operational control message information to interface modules connected to the second bus;
site interface modules, each site interface module interfacing communications between the first and second buses and a corresponding one of the site controllers; and
a local network interface module connected to the first and second buses for transferring and receiving information between the local and remote digital switches,wherein site configuration information is transferred between the plural digital switches for updating adjacent site configuration information as radio units roam over the wide area network.
8 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Digitally trunked radio transceivers are permitted to roam over an extended coverage area including two or more digitally trunked radio frequency communication networks. Each network includes at least one digital repeater site having a corresponding site coverage area and serving digitally trunked radio transceivers disposed within or near the site coverage area. Each network also includes a local multisite switch for routing communications between the digital repeater sites within the networks. Site adjacency information is established for each site and communicated between the networks. Each digitally trunked transceiver maintains a site adjacency list for its currently selected site and modifies that list when the transceiver roams into a new site coverage area and selects a new repeater site.
-
Citations
14 Claims
-
1. A trunked communications system in which portable/mobile radio units roam from one geographical area to another over a wide area communications network, comprising:
-
plural trunked rf repeater site controllers located in associated geographical areas for coordinating rf communications with radio units within or near the associated areas, each radio unit selecting one of the site controllers through for conducting communications over the wide area network; plural digital switches including a local switch and a remote switch, each digital switch including; a first bus for conveying digital audio information during preassigned time slots to interface modules connected to the first bus; a second bus for conveying operational control message information to interface modules connected to the second bus; site interface modules, each site interface module interfacing communications between the first and second buses and a corresponding one of the site controllers; and a local network interface module connected to the first and second buses for transferring and receiving information between the local and remote digital switches, wherein site configuration information is transferred between the plural digital switches for updating adjacent site configuration information as radio units roam over the wide area network. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
-
-
6. A digitally trunked radio frequency communications system, including plural repeater sites having corresponding coverage areas, each site having one or more adjacent sites and serving mobile or portable digitally trunked radio transceivers disposed within the site'"'"'s coverage area, for supporting digitally encoded radio transceiver communications over distributed control multisite switch networks that route communications between repeater sites within the system, comprising:
a network interface module in a local multisite switch network for transferring and receiving digitally encoded communications including adjacent site information to/from one or more remote multisite switch networks thereby interconnecting a plurality of otherwise independent multisite switches resulting in extended, wide area, digitally trunked, radio frequency communications coverage. - View Dependent Claims (7)
-
8. A method for permitting digitally trunked radio transceivers to roam over two or more digitally trunked radio frequency communications networks, each network including at least two digital repeater sites having a corresponding coverage areas adjacent to each other and serving digitally trunked radio transceivers disposed within or near the coverage areas, and each network including a local distributed control multisite switch for routing communications between said digital repeater sites within the networks, comprising steps of:
-
(a) communicating site adjacency information between the two or more networks; (b) establishing and maintaining a site adjacency database for repeater sites in the two or more networks based on the communicated site adjacency information; and (c) modifying a site adjacency list maintained by one of the digitally trunked transceivers as the transceiver roams into a new coverage area and selects a new repeater site corresponding to the new coverage area to coordinate communications to/from the transceiver. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
-
-
14. A method for permitting trunked radio transceivers to roam over two or more trunked radio frequency communications networks, each network including digital repeater sites having corresponding site coverage areas in a particular geographical site configuration and serving trunked radio transceivers disposed within or near the coverage areas, and each network including a digital switch for routing communications to and from said one or more repeater sites, wherein as trunked radio receivers roam over the two or more trunked radio frequency communications networks, geographical site configuration information is transferred between digital network switches.
Specification