Telecommunication method supporting multiple air interfaces

• US 7,433,707 B2
• Filed: 11/04/2003
• Issued: 10/07/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 12/16/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: WSOU Investments, LLC (WSOU Holdings, LLC)
• Original Assignee: Alcatel SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Haberland, Bernd, Bakker, Hajo, Kaminski, Stephen
• Primary Examiner(s): Trost, William
• Assistant Examiner(s): SANTIAGO CORDERO, MARIVELISSE
• Application Number:
  US10/699,687
• Publication Number:
  US 20040116153A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,799 Days
• Field of Search: 455/552.1, 4554351-4352, 4554321-4322, 455/452.2, 455524-525
• US Class Current: 455/552.1
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/16 Central resource management; Negotiation of resources or communication parameters, e.g. negotiating bandwidth or QoS [Quality of Service]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/00 Local resource management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/08 Access point devices

Abstract

The invention relates to a telecommunication method comprising the steps of: receiving of a required quality of service parameter set from a core network by a radio network controller, selecting a sub-set of air interfaces from a set of air interfaces, the sub-set containing air interfaces, which support the required quality of service parameter set, providing the sub-set to a node of a radio access network having the set of air interfaces, selecting an air interface from the sub-set by the node for providing the required quality of service to a user equipment.

Claims

1. A telecommunication method comprising the steps of:

receiving a required quality of service parameter set from a core network by a radio network controller,

receiving a monitoring list by the radio network controller, the monitoring list including a set of air interfaces, supported by a node of a radio access network, by which the node can actually establish a telecommunication link with the user equipment, and a quality of service parameter for each air interface in the set of air interfaces,

selecting a sub-set of air interfaces from the set of air interfaces, the sub-set containing air interfaces, which support the required quality of service parameter set,

providing the sub-set to the node having the set of air interfaces,

selecting an air interface from the sub-set by the node for providing the required quality of service to a user equipment.

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

receiving data being indicative of at least one of the air interfaces of the set of air interfaces, the at least one interface having no more free data transmission capacity,

eliminating the at least one air interface from the sub-set.

3. The method of claim 1, whereby the selection of the air interface is performed by the node based on load balancing and/or actual availability of the air interfaces.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising the steps of:

establishing a first telecommunication link by means of the selected one of the set of air interfaces and sending of data frames having a first data frame format of the selected air interface,

mapping the first data frame format to a second data frame format of an alternative one of the set of air interfaces,

replacing the selected air interface by the alternative interface and sending the mapped data frames having the second air interface format via a second telecommunication link which has been established by means of the alternative air interface.

5. The method of claim 4, the selected air interface being an Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) air interface and the first air interface format being High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), the alternative air interface being wireless local area network (WLAN) and the second air interface format being WLAN frames.

6. The telecommunication method according to claim 1, further comprising:

storing said set of air interfaces by the radio network controller;

selecting by the radio network controller the sub-set of air interfaces from said set of air interfaces by referencing a list comprising air interfaces and corresponding quality of service parameters, wherein the list is stored in the radio network controller; and

providing by the radio network controller to the node the selected sub-set of air interfaces.

7. The telecommunication method according to claim 6, further comprising storing, by the node, medium access control components corresponding to respective air interfaces available at the node, wherein said node selects the air interface and maps the selected air interface to a corresponding medium access control component.

8. The telecommunication method according to claim 7, further comprising changing by the node the selected air-interface to another air interface, wherein said another air interface is selected by the node from the provided sub-set of air interfaces without communicating with the radio network controller.

9. The telecommunication method according to claim 1, further comprising the node changing the selected air interface to another air interface selected on the fly from the provided sub-set of air interfaces, wherein said changing further comprises remapping data of the user equipment from a current physical layer to a different physical layer.

10. The telecommunication method according to claim 1, wherein the sub-set of air interfaces comprises at least two air interfaces.

14. A telecommunication system comprising a radio network controller having means for receiving a required quality of service parameter set from a core network, means for selecting a sub-set of air interfaces from a set of air interfaces, the sub-set containing air interfaces which support the required quality of service, and means for providing the sub-set to a node of the radio access network having the set of air interfaces, said system further comprising a node of claim 9, the node being coupled to the radio network controller.

11. A computer-readable medium comprising instructions for performing the operations of:

inputting a required quality of service parameter set which has been received from a core network by a radio network controller,

receiving a monitoring list by the radio network controller, the monitoring list including a set of air interfaces, supported by a node of a radio access network, by which the node can actually establish a telecommunication link with a user equipment, and a quality of service parameter for each air interface in the set of air interfaces,

selecting a sub-set of air interfaces from the set of air interfaces, the sub-set containing air-interfaces which support the required quality of service parameter set,

outputting the sub-set for providing the sub-set to a node of a radio access network having the set of air interfaces for selection of an air interface from the sub-set by the node for providing the required quality of service to the user equipment.

12. A radio network controller of a radio access network comprising:

means for receiving a required quality of service parameter set from a core network,

means for receiving a monitoring list, the monitoring list including a set of air interfaces, supported by a node of a radio access network, by which the node can actually establish a telecommunication link with a user equipment, and a quality of service parameter for each air interface in the set of air interfaces,

means for selecting a sub-set of air interfaces from the set of air interfaces, the sub-set containing air interfaces which support the required quality of service,

means for providing the sub-set to a node of the radio access network having the set of air interfaces.

13. A node of a radio access network having a set of air interfaces, the node comprising:

means for transmitting a list of available air interfaces to a radio network controller, the list including a set of air interfaces, supported by the node, by which the node can actually establish a telecommunication link with a user equipment, and a quality of service parameter for each air interface in the set of air interfaces,

means for receiving a sub-set of air interfaces from a radio network controller of the radio access network,

means for selecting an air interface from the sub-set for providing a required quality of service to a user equipment, the means for selecting the air interface being adapted to perform the selection based on load balancing and/or current availability of the air interfaces of the sub-set.