Method and apparatus providing spatial diversity within an indoor network

• US 6,590,884 B1
• Filed: 01/07/1999
• Issued: 07/08/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 01/07/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Texas Instruments, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Texas Instruments, Inc.
• Inventors: Panasik, Carl M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Kizou, Hassan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Elallam, Ahmed
• Application Number:
  US09/226,578
• Time in Patent Office: 1,643 Days
• Field of Search: 370/276, 370/277, 370/294, 370/310, 370/312, 370/328, 370/338, 370/334, 370/345, 370/432, 370/437, 375/267, 375/299, 375/347, 455/101, 455/137
• US Class Current: 370/338
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 3/72 Diversity systems specially adapted for direction-finding
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/022 Site diversity; Macro-diversity using two or more spaced independent antennas H04B7/04
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/0842 Weighted combining
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/06 using space diversity

Abstract

A method and architecture that provides network level spatial diversity using multiple indoor access points (70) has a transceiver coupled to each wireless computing device on the network. Signals from each wireless computing device are transmitted to more than one access point on the network. The signal is sampled and aligned to permit calculation of amplitude and phase values at each point as a function of time. The phase and amplitude data are stored and used to create a vector matrix associated with the specific computing device which can be continuously updated as the computing device is moved from one location to another within the network environment.

Claims

1. A method of determining the spatial distinctiveness of a plurality of computing devices within a wireless networked environment comprising the steps of:

transmitting a signal from at least one of said computing devices to a group of access points on the network;

converting the signal from an analog to a digital equivalent using over-sampling to obtain a plurality of vector data, at each access point within the group; and

combining the vector data into a vector matrix, said vector matrix containing a plurality of amplitude and phase versus time data associated with at least one of said computing devices so that the spatial location of said computing device in said network environment may be determined.

2. The method according to claim 1 further comprising the steps of:

receiving the vector matrix; and

de-encoding the vector matrix to determine the spatial location of the specific computing device associated with said vector matrix.

3. The method according to claim 2 further comprising the steps of:

aligning the data in the vector matrix; and

combining the aligned vector matrix data to create a spatial diversity matrix associated with a specific one of said computing devices.

4. The method according to claim 3 further comprising the step of transmitting the spatial diversity matrix to a network interface element.

5. The method according to claim 1 wherein a step of aligning the data in the vector matrix involves phasing all the signals coherently about a given point in space.

6. The method according to claim 1 wherein a step of aligning the data in the vector matrix involves phasing all the signal coherently about a given point in space and the step of modulating the data utilizes a separate code for each antenna.

7. A wireless network with network level spatial diversity comprising:

a network backbone having a network interface with a network server;

a plurality of access points coupled to said backbone;

at least one computing device in wireless communications with said network server through more than one of said access points;

wherein said access points are configured to provide the spatial diversity of said computing device within the network environment spanned by said access points; and

wherein each one of said plurality of access points further comprise;

an encoder having an output terminal coupled to said network backbone and an input terminal;

an Analog-to-Digital Conversion (ADC) circuit having an output terminal coupled to said input terminal of said encoder, said ADC conversion circuit further having an analog input; and

a transceiver means coupled to said analog input of said ADC conversion circuit.

8. The wireless network according to claim 7 further comprising an antenna coupled to said transceiver for receiving signal from network entities.

9. The wireless network according to claim 7 wherein said ADC is configured to over-sample signals received from computing devices within the network.

10. The wireless network according to claim 7 wherein said encoder is configured to encode the output from said ADC with a special code associated with at least one access point on the network.

11. The wireless network according to claim 7 wherein said transceiver means locks onto a common broadcast RF pilot tone.