System and method of a wireless network operation and maintenance

• US 7,483,410 B1
• Filed: 12/20/2005
• Issued: 01/27/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 11/28/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Inventors: Young, Choi II, Joo, Ki-Hyun, Kang, Chol Su, Hong, Jay Wu
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen; Chau T.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Moore, Jr.; Michael J
• Application Number:
  US11/315,847
• Time in Patent Office: 1,134 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 370/335
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/12 WLAN [Wireless Local Area Networks]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/18 Service support devices; Network management devices

Abstract

A wireless office communication system including a multi-protocol wireless internet base station (WIBS) encompassing a base station controller, a mobile switch controller and an ethernet interface module for coupling the WIBS to an existing internet protocol (IP) based network. The interface module provides for coupling the WIBS to an ethernet back-bone, a mobile communication unit and a public switch telephone network (PSTN). In one embodiment of the invention, a maintenance and operation server is coupled to the ethernet back-bone to allow a technician to remotely call into the enterprise system from a mobile system such as a lap-top computer or a personal digital assistant (PDA) to perform typical system operations and maintenance functions via the internet.

Claims

1. An apparatus for communicating data, comprising:

a maintenance and operations (M&

O) server coupled to a local area network (LAN), which is coupled to a plurality of wireless base stations, wherein the M&

O server includes call negotiation logic for negotiating unique call identification numbers between the M&

O server and a selected wireless base station in order to enable remote wireless M&

O clients to communicate with the M&

O server.

2. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

a call agent coupled to the LAN and operable to process wireless calls from mobile communication units to an enterprise wireless communication system.

3. The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the unique call identification numbers enable the selected wireless base station to process M&

O calls without deferring processing of the calls to the call agent.

4. The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the selected wireless base station further includes call identification number negotiation logic for negotiating a unique call identification number between the M&

O server and the selected wireless base station to enable remote wireless M&

O clients to communicate with the M&

O server.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the selected wireless base station further includes wireless operation and maintenance call processing logic operable to accommodate wireless M&

O client call requests.

6. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the M&

O server includes call processing logic for processing call requests from remote wireless M&

O clients to an enterprise communication system.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the plurality of wireless base stations include wireless call processing logic operable to accommodate conventional wireless communication functions.

8. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein in order to establish a data link to the M&

O server, a mobile unit transmits an access request to the selected base station, and wherein the access request is in a form of a unique call identification number that was predetermined by the M&

O server and the selected base station.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein once the data link is established, a point-to-point protocol is established between the mobile unit and the M&

O server such that operational commands and instructions are transferred.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein once the protocol is established an HTTP session is established in order to access maintenance and operation tools resident in the M&

O server.