Short range RF network configuration
First Claim
1. A method of configuring a short range RF network, the network comprising at least one host node and at least two wireless transceiver nodes, each transceiver node having a controller, a data store, and at least one transceiver for communicating wirelessly with other host and transceiver nodes, each transceiver having a unique identifier, the method comprising the steps of:
- (a) assigning a predetermined value to a variable n and associating the at least one host with a value of n;
(b) paging all other nodes from the node associated with the value of n;
(c) noting nodes which reply to paging and associating them with a value of (n+1);
(d) making all nodes associated with the value of n or with lower values unresponsive to paging;
(e) incrementing the value of n; and
(f) repeating steps (b) through (e) until no nodes reply to paging;
whereby the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of the at least one host node but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to said at least one host node and in wireless communication with said at least one host node become identified and accessible to said at least one host node by relaying through said intermediate transceiver nodes;
wherein;
control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node;
each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and
each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A network including a host device and a plurality of transceiver satellite nodes for communicating data from terminal devices interacting with the nodes, to the host. The nodes include identification codes used by the host for establishing wireless communication links either between a node and the host, or between two or more nodes. The host includes a data store for storing identification codes of nodes. The host pages the nodes by their identification codes and, upon establishing communication with a node, the list of identification codes is passed to the node, which then pages other nodes which may be out of range of the host, which then receive the list and may page yet other nodes, until all listed nodes are linked into the network. A tag reader is connected or connectable to the host for reading tags associated with nodes and thereby capturing the identification codes of the nodes.
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Citations
53 Claims
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1. A method of configuring a short range RF network, the network comprising at least one host node and at least two wireless transceiver nodes, each transceiver node having a controller, a data store, and at least one transceiver for communicating wirelessly with other host and transceiver nodes, each transceiver having a unique identifier, the method comprising the steps of:
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(a) assigning a predetermined value to a variable n and associating the at least one host with a value of n; (b) paging all other nodes from the node associated with the value of n; (c) noting nodes which reply to paging and associating them with a value of (n+1); (d) making all nodes associated with the value of n or with lower values unresponsive to paging; (e) incrementing the value of n; and (f) repeating steps (b) through (e) until no nodes reply to paging; whereby the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of the at least one host node but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to said at least one host node and in wireless communication with said at least one host node become identified and accessible to said at least one host node by relaying through said intermediate transceiver nodes; wherein; control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node; each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. A method of configuring a short range RF network, the network comprising a plurality of network at least one host node and at least two wireless transceiver nodes for communicating wirelessly with other host and transceiver nodes, each transceiver having a controller unit and a data store, the method comprising the steps of:
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a) storing identifiers of all nodes on the network in a data store accessible to the at least one host node; b) paging other nodes from the at least one host node; c) detecting other nodes within a coverage area of the at least one host node by receiving responses of said detected nodes to paging; d) updating information regarding said detected nodes according to the received responses of said detected nodes to paging; e) associating said detected nodes with a first value of a dynamic variable, the value of the dynamic variable depending on the placement of each said detected node in the network; and f) propagating the updated information to said detected nodes in the network; whereby the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of the at least one host node but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to said at least one host node and in wireless communication with said at least one host node become identified and accessible to said at least one host node by relaying through said one or more intermediate transceiver nodes; wherein; control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node; each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27)
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28. A self-configuring short range RF network, the network comprising:
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a plurality of nodes for communicating wirelessly with other nodes of the RF network, wherein at least one of the nodes is selected as a control node, each node including; a control logic; a data store connected to the control logic; at least one transceiver connected to the control logic and identified by a unique address for communicating wirelessly with other nodes of the network; a transceiver list database connected to the data store for storing updateable information of all transceivers of the RF network for network configuration; and a dynamic variable linked to the transceiver list database for indicating position of each node in the RF network relative to the control node, wherein a transceiver of the control node pages other transceivers in its transceiver list;
a transceiver of the control node detects other nodes within its coverage area according to response of said other transceivers to paging;
the control node'"'"'s transceiver list is updated according to said response of said other transceivers to paging;
the control logic associates detected transceivers'"'"' information in the control node'"'"'s transceiver list with a current value of the dynamic variable; and
the control logic directs propagating the updated contents of the control node'"'"'s transceiver list to all detected nodes in the network,whereby the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of control nodes but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to a control node and in wireless communication with said control node become identified to said control node by relaying through said one or more intermediate transceiver nodes; wherein; the control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node; each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes. - View Dependent Claims (29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39)
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40. A self-configuring short range RF network comprising:
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a plurality of nodes for communicating wirelessly with other nodes of the RF network, wherein at least one of the nodes is selected as a control node, each node including; a control logic; a data store connected to the control logic; at least one transceiver connected to the control logic and identified by a unique address for communicating wirelessly with other nodes of the network; a transceiver list database connected to the data store for storing updateable information of all transceivers of the RF network for network configuration; and a dynamic variable linked to the transceiver list database for indicating position of each node in the RF network relative to the control node; wherein associated with each transceiver is a unique password, provided with each transceiver is a machine-readable tag on which is recorded the transceiver'"'"'s unique address and password, and associated with the control node is a reader for reading unique addresses and passwords from the tags and storing them in a first node'"'"'s transceiver list, wherein the network is configured such that; (a) a transceiver of the control node pages other transceivers in its transceiver list; (b) a transceiver of the control node detects other nodes within its coverage area according to response of said other transceivers to paging; (c) the control node'"'"'s transceiver list is updated according to said response of said other transceivers to paging; (d) the control logic associates detected transceivers'"'"' information in the control node'"'"'s transceiver list with a current value of the dynamic variable; and (e) the control logic directs propagating the updated contents of the control node'"'"'s transceiver list to all detected nodes in the network; and (f) the control logic of each detected node directs incrementing the dynamic variable; (g) a transceiver of each node pages other transceivers in its transceiver list; (h) each node detects other nodes within the coverage area of its transceiver according to response of said other transceivers to paging; (i) each node'"'"'s control logic directs updating the node'"'"'s transceiver list according to response of said other transceivers to paging; (j) the node'"'"'s control logic associates detected transceivers'"'"' information in the node'"'"'s transceiver list with a current value of the dynamic variable; (k) the control logic directs propagating the updated contents of each node'"'"'s transceiver list to all detected nodes in the network; and functions (g) through (k) are repeated until all nodes of the network are detected; and wherein the control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node; each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes. - View Dependent Claims (41, 42, 43)
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44. A node for use in a self-configuring short range RF network, comprising:
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a backbone transceiver identified by a unique address and associated with a password, for communicating with other nodes of the network; and control logic configured to compute an indication of current load carried by the node and detect when the backbone transceiver receives a paging message directed to its unique address, and in response, to direct that; a password received in the paging message be verified as the password associated with the backbone transceiver; a node transceiver list received in the paging message, containing addresses and passwords of other nodes in the network, be received and stored; a value “
n”
of a dynamic variable received in the paging message be received and stored;the node becomes unresponsive to further paging messages; the node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; the node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes; and the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of the node but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to the node and in wireless communication with said node become identified and accessible to the node by relaying through said one or more intermediate transceiver nodes. - View Dependent Claims (45, 46, 47, 48, 49)
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50. A self-configuring short range RF network, the network comprising:
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a plurality of nodes for communicating wirelessly with other nodes of the RF network, wherein at least one of the nodes is selected as a control node, each node including; a control logic; a data store connected to the control logic; at least one transceiver connected to the control logic identified by a unique address for communicating wirelessly with other nodes of the network either directly or through one or more relay nodes; and software means operative on the control logic for; maintaining in the data store a transceiver list database containing updateable information of all transceivers of the RF network for network configuration; indicating, with a dynamic variable linked to the transceiver list database, position of each node in the RF network in relation to the control node; periodically communicating wirelessly among the nodes of the RF network for exchanging updated configuration information and dynamic variable information; and updating current network configuration information and dynamic variable information within the data store; whereby the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of at least one control node but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to said at least one control node and in wireless communication with said at least one control node become identified to said at least one control node by relaying through said one or more intermediate transceiver nodes; wherein; the control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node; each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes. - View Dependent Claims (51, 52)
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53. A method of configuring short range RF network, the method comprising the steps of:
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electronically maintaining, for network configuration, a transceiver list database containing updateable information regarding all transceivers of the RF network; indicating a position of each node in the RF network in relation to a control node with a dynamic variable linked to the transceiver list database; periodically communicating wirelessly between nodes of the RF network for exchanging updated configuration information and dynamic variable information; and updating current network configuration information and dynamic variable information within the transceiver list database; whereby the network is configured such that transceiver nodes beyond a transmission range of at least one control node but within transmission range of one or more intermediate transceiver nodes accessible to said at least one control node and in wireless communication with said at least one control node become identified and accessible to said at least one control node by relaying through said one or more intermediate transceiver nodes; wherein; control logic of each node computes an indication of current load carried by the node; each node dynamically transmits its load indication at least to nodes within its transmission range; and each node dynamically receives and stores load indications received from other nodes.
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Specification