Wireless slave unit

• US 8,588,131 B2
• Filed: 06/13/2005
• Issued: 11/19/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/16/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Panasonic Corporation (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Panasonic Corporation (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Sato, Shuichi, Hamamoto, Yasuo, Hayashino, Hiroshi, Ohta, Kazuhiro, Ukita, Yosuke, Nakae, Hironori, Ohta, Yoshitaka
• Primary Examiner(s): Rinehart, Mark
• Assistant Examiner(s): ANWAR, MOHAMMAD S
• Application Number:
  US11/629,295
• Publication Number:
  US 20090161600A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,081 Days
• Field of Search: 370/328, 370/329, 370/330, 370/331, 370/332
• US Class Current: 370/328
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/06 Optimizing the usage of the radio link, e.g. header compression, information sizing , discarding information system modifying transmission characteristic according to link quality by modifying frame length H04L1/0007; dynamic adaptation of the packet size for flow control or congestion control H04L47/365
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 68/00 User notification, e.g. alerting and paging, for incoming communication, change of service or the like
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/26 Network addressing or numbering for mobility support
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/22 with access to wired networks

Abstract

A wireless slave device for performing wireless network communication with another wireless slave device, the other wireless slave device being connected to a terminal, and wired network communication with a terminal, the wireless slave device including a wireless reception unit that wirelessly receives a notification frame including a MAC address of the terminal connected to the other wireless slave device and a MAC address of the other wireless slave device, a storage unit that associates and stores the MAC address of the other wireless slave device and the MAC address of the terminal both included in the wirelessly received notification frame, a wire reception unit that receives a frame transmitted from the terminal connected to the wireless slave device, and a filtering unit that discards the frame if the transmission destination MAC address of the frame received by wire does not match the MAC address stored in the storage unit.

Claims

1. A wireless slave device for performing, in a wireless network managed by a wireless master device, wireless network communication with the wireless master device, and for performing wired network communication with one or more terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, the wireless slave device comprising:

a wireless reception unit operable to wirelessly receive, from the wireless master device that relays communication between the wireless slave device and another wireless slave device that belongs to the wireless network, a wireless frame that is (i) transmitted from one or more other terminals connected by wire to the other wireless slave device and (ii) addressed to the one or more terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device, the wireless frame storing, in a frame body, (a) data of a first frame that includes information indicating an address of the one or more other terminals and (b) connection information indicating an address of the other wireless slave device which relays the first frame, the address of the other wireless slave device being added by the other wireless slave device;

a storage unit operable to store the address of the other wireless slave device in association with each of the addresses of the one or more other terminals included in the wirelessly received wireless frame;

a wire reception unit operable to receive, by wire, a second frame that includes a transmission destination address and that has been transmitted from the one or more terminals connected by wire to the wireless slave device; and

a setting unit operable, when the transmission destination address of the second frame received by the wire reception unit matches any of the addresses of the one or more other terminals stored in the storage unit, to specify the address of the other wireless slave device stored in association with the address of each of the one or more other terminals and to perform a setting for direct wireless communication without involving the wireless master device.

2. The wireless slave device of claim 1,

wherein the wireless frame further includes information showing an address of a BSSID (Basic Service Set Identifier) of a wireless master device to which the other wireless slave device belongs, and

wherein, when the address or the BSSID of the wireless master device matches an address of a BSSID of a wireless master device to which the wireless slave device belongs, the storage unit stores the address of the other wireless slave device included in the wireless frame in association with each of the addresses of the one or more other terminals.

3. The wireless slave device of claim 2,

wherein the wireless frame is an ARP (Address Resolution Protocol) Request packet of an ARP Response packet transmitted by the one or more other terminals to the one or more terminals, and

wherein the other wireless slave device, which relays the ARP Request packet and the ARP Response packet, adds information to the wireless frame showing the address of the other wireless slave device and an address or a BSSID of the wireless master device to which the another wireless slave device belongs.

4. The wireless slave device of claim 3, further comprising

a packet identification unit operable to identify a kind of the second frame received by the wire reception unit, and

wherein, when the packet identification unit identifies that the second frame received by the wire reception unit is a bandwidth setting request transmitted by the one or more terminals to the one or more other terminals so as to ensure communication required for data transmission, the setting unit specifies the address of the other wireless slave device stored in association with each of the addresses of one or more other terminals, and performs a setting for direct wireless communication without involving the wireless master device.

5. The wireless slave device of claim 4, further comprising

a wireless transmitting unit operable, when the setting unit has succeeded in performing the setting for direct wireless communication with the other wireless slave device, to directly wirelessly transmit the bandwidth setting request to the other wireless slave device.