Method and apparatus for dynamic assignment of quality of service parameters in a communication network

• US 8,428,067 B2
• Filed: 01/25/2008
• Issued: 04/23/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/04/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Honeywell International Inc.
• Original Assignee: Honeywell International Inc.
• Inventors: Budampati, Ramakrishna S., Kolavennu, Soumitri N., Kune, Denis Foo
• Primary Examiner(s): Phillips, Hassan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Sharma, Gautam
• Application Number:
  US12/020,227
• Publication Number:
  US 20090059786A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,915 Days
• Field of Search: 370228-332, 370/351, 370/389, 370/392, 370/395.21
• US Class Current: 370/395.21
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/00 Routing or path finding of packets in data switching networks routing or path finding in wireless networks H04W40/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/308 Route determination based on user's profile, e.g. premium users
• 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 40/12 based on transmission quality or channel quality
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

A method includes identifying a condition associated with a communication network and/or an industrial control and automation system. The method also includes selecting, based on the identified condition, one or more quality of service (QoS) parameters used to route data through the communication network. In addition, the method includes communicating information identifying the one or more QoS parameters to one or more components in the communication network. The one or more QoS parameters could be contained within one of multiple QoS policies, and the method could include selecting one of the QoS policies. The condition could represent an emergency condition, and the one or more QoS parameters could include a higher QoS priority for traffic (such as voice communications and sensor data) to and from specified personnel (such as first responders). The communication network could represent at least one wired network and/or at least one wireless network.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, at a first leaf node, a plurality of quality of service parameters associated with at least one quality of service class, the quality of service parameters further associated with an industrial control and automation system comprising a plurality of wireless internally-powered leaf nodes and a plurality of line-powered infrastructure nodes, the quality of service parameters being transmitted by a gateway node to at least one of the infrastructure nodes and then wirelessly transmitted to the first leaf node, the gateway node configured to convert the quality of service parameters from an Ethernet format to an IEEE 802.11 wireless protocol format;

identifying, at the first leaf node, an emergency condition associated with the industrial control and automation system;

selecting, at the first leaf node and based on the identified emergency condition, one or more quality of service parameters of at least one data message to be routed through a communication network associated with the industrial control and automation system;

based on the plurality of received quality of service parameters and the one or more selected quality of service parameters, assigning at the first leaf node a specified quality of service class to the at least one data message; and

communicating, from the first leaf node, the at least one data message with the assigned quality of service class to at least one of;

one or more other leaf nodes and one or more infrastructure nodes in the communication network;

wherein;

the leaf nodes and the infrastructure nodes in the communication network operate according to a first quality of service policy;

selecting the one or more quality of service parameters comprises selecting a second quality of service policy;

the second quality of service policy identifies a priority for each of multiple types of data messages based upon a type of identified emergency condition and a recipient of information; and

an operation of the gateway node and the infrastructure nodes is configured by an OLE for Process Control (OPC) server, the OPC server configured to distribute cryptographic security keys to the gateway node and at least one of the infrastructure nodes.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

selecting the first quality of service policy; and

communicating information identifying the first quality of service policy over the communication network.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein selecting the one or more quality of service parameters comprises identifying a higher quality of service priority for traffic to and from specified personnel.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein:

the specified personnel comprise at least one of;

police officers, firefighters, medical personnel, and hazardous material personnel; and

the traffic comprises real-time sensor data.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more selected quality of service parameters comprise at least one of:

an encryption mechanism, an authentication mechanism, a number of routes traversed through the communication network, a number of retries for sending data, and use of end-to-end acknowledgements.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

identifying a second condition associated with at least one of;

the communication network and the industrial control and automation system;

selecting, based on the identified second condition, one or more second quality of service parameters; and

communicating information identifying the one or more second quality of service parameters to the one or more other leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining that the emergency condition has been resolved;

selecting one or more second quality of service parameters associated with normal operation of the communication network; and

communicating information identifying the one or more second quality of service parameters to the one or more other leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network.

8. An apparatus comprising:

a first wireless leaf node comprising;

at least one interface that communicates with other nodes in a communication network associated with an industrial control and automation system, the industrial control and automation system comprising a plurality of wireless internally-powered leaf nodes and a plurality of line-powered infrastructure nodes; and

at least one controller that;

receives a plurality of quality of service parameters associated with at least one quality of service class from a gateway node via at least one of the infrastructure nodes, the quality of service parameters further associated with the industrial control and automation system, the gateway node configured to convert the quality of service parameters from an Ethernet format to an IEEE 802.11 wireless protocol format;

identifies an emergency condition associated with the industrial control and automation system;

selects, based on the identified emergency condition, one or more quality of service parameters of at least one data message to be routed through the communication network;

based on the plurality of received quality of service parameters and the one or more selected quality of service parameters, assigns a specified quality of service class to the at least one data message; and

communicates the at least one data message with the assigned quality of service class to at least one of;

one or more other leaf nodes and one or more infrastructure nodes in the communication network using the at least one interface;

wherein;

the leaf nodes and the infrastructure nodes in the communication network operate according to a first quality of service policy;

the at least one controller selects the one or more quality of service parameters by selecting a second quality of service policy;

the second quality of service policy identifies a priority for each of multiple types of data messages based upon a type of identified emergency condition and a recipient of information; and

an operation of the gateway node and the infrastructure nodes is configured by an OLE for Process Control (OPC) server, the OPC server configured to distribute cryptographic security keys to the gateway node and at least one of the infrastructure nodes.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the at least one controller selects the one or more quality of service parameters by selecting the second quality of service policy from multiple quality of service policies.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein:

the at least one controller further communicates the multiple quality of service policies to the one or more other leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network prior to the selection of the second quality of service policy; and

the at least one controller communicates information identifying the selected second quality of service policy to the one or more leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network.

11. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the at least one controller selects the one or more quality of service parameters by identifying a higher quality of service priority for traffic to and from specified personnel.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein:

the specified personnel comprise at least one of;

police officers, firefighters, medical personnel, and hazardous material personnel; and

the traffic comprises real-time sensor data.

13. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the one or more selected quality of service parameters comprise at least one of:

an encryption mechanism, an authentication mechanism, a number of routes traversed through the communication network, a number of retries for sending data, and use of end-to-end acknowledgements.

14. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the at least one controller further:

identifies a second condition associated with at least one of;

the communication network and the industrial control and automation system;

selects, based on the identified second condition, one or more second quality of service parameters; and

communicates information identifying the one or more second quality of service parameters to the one or more other leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network.

15. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the at least one controller further:

determines that the condition has been resolved;

selects one or more second quality of service parameters associated with normal operation of the communication network; and

communicates information identifying the one or more second quality of service parameters to the one or more other leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network.

16. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the at least one interface comprises one or more of:

a wired Ethernet network interface; and

a radio frequency transceiver.

19. The computer readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein the one or more selected quality of service parameters comprise at least one of:

an encryption mechanism, an authentication mechanism, a number of routes traversed through the communication network, a number of retries for sending data, and use of end-to-end acknowledgements.

17. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium embodying a computer program, the computer program comprising computer readable program code for:

receiving, at a first leaf node, a plurality of quality of service parameters associated with at least one quality of service class from a gateway node via at least one of a plurality of line-powered infrastructure nodes, the quality of service parameters further associated with an industrial control and automation system comprising a plurality of wireless internally-powered leaf nodes and the plurality of line-powered infrastructure nodes, the gateway node configured to convert the quality of service parameters from an Ethernet format to an IEEE 802.11 wireless protocol format;

identifying, at the first leaf node, an emergency condition associated with the industrial control and automation system;

selecting, at the first leaf node and based on the identified emergency condition, one or more quality of service parameters of at least one data message to be routed through a communication network associated with the industrial control and automation system;

based on the plurality of received quality of service parameters and the one or more selected quality of service parameters, assigning at the first leaf node a specified quality of service class to the at least one data message; and

communicating, from the first leaf node, the at least one data message with the assigned quality of service class to at least one of;

one or more other leaf nodes and one or more infrastructure nodes in the communication network;

wherein;

the leaf nodes and the infrastructure nodes in the communication network operate according to a first quality of service policy;

the computer readable program code for selecting the one or more quality of service parameters comprises computer readable program code for selecting a second quality of service policy;

the second quality of service policy identifies a priority for each of multiple types of data messages based upon a type of identified emergency condition and a recipient of information; and

an operation of the gateway node and the infrastructure nodes is configured by an OLE for Process Control (OPC) server, the OPC server configured to distribute cryptographic security keys to the gateway node and at least one of the infrastructure nodes.

18. The computer readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the computer readable program code for selecting the one or more quality of service parameters comprises computer readable program code for selecting the second quality of service policy from multiple quality of service policies.

20. The computer readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the computer program further comprises computer readable program code for:

determining that the emergency condition has been resolved;

selecting one or more second quality of service parameters associated with normal operation of the communication network; and

communicating information identifying the one or more second quality of service parameters to the one or more other leaf nodes and infrastructure nodes in the communication network.