Transmission control protocol/internet protocol (TCP/IP) packet-centric wireless point to multi-point (PtMP) transmission system architecture

• US 9,712,289 B2
• Filed: 06/12/2012
• Issued: 07/18/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 07/10/1998
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Intellectual Ventures I LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Original Assignee: Intellectual Ventures I LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Inventors: Jorgensen, Jacob W.
• Primary Examiner(s): Sison, June
• Assistant Examiner(s): NGUYEN, STEVEN C
• Application Number:
  US13/494,904
• Publication Number:
  US 20120257527A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,862 Days
• Field of Search: 709224
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/20 using signal quality detector
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1813 for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms instant messaging H04L51/04; protocols for multimedia communication H04L65/1101; arrangements for multi-party communication H04L65/403; telephonic conference arrangements H04M3/56; television conference systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1836 with heterogeneous network architecture
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/189 in combination with wireless systems selective distribution or broadcast in wireless communication networks H04W4/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0272 Virtual private networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/16 Implementation or adaptation of Internet protocol [IP], of transmission control protocol [TCP] or of user datagram protocol [UDP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/161 Implementation details of TCP/IP or UDP/IP stack architecture; Specification of modified or new header fields
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/163 In-band adaptation of TCP data exchange; In-band control procedures
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/165 Combined use of TCP and UDP protocols; selection criteria therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/168 specially adapted for link layer protocols, e.g. asynchronous transfer mode [ATM], synchronous optical network [SONET] or point-to-point protocol [PPP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/169 Special adaptations of TCP, UDP or IP for interworking of IP based networks with other networks protocols for interworking, protocol conversion H04L69/08
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 11/0414 Details
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/1305 Software aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13096 Digital apparatus individually associated with a subscriber line, digital line circuits
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13097 Numbering, addressing
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13098 Mobile subscriber
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13141 Hunting for free outlet, circuit or channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13166 Fault prevention
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13176 Common channel signaling, CCS7
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13196 : Connection circuit/link/trunk/junction, bridge, router, gateway
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13204 : Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13216 : Code signals, frame structure
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/1322 : PBX
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13292 : Time division multiplexing, TDM
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13296 : Packet switching, X.25, frame relay
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13348 : Channel/line reservation
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2213/13389 : LAN, internet
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/033 : of the user plane, e.g. user's traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 : Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/18 : Negotiating wireless communication parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/20 : Negotiating bandwidth
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/24 : Negotiating SLA [Service Level Agreement]; Negotiating QoS [Quality of Service]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/26 : Resource reservation
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 48/12 : using downlink control channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/04 : Wireless resource allocation
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/0453 : Resources in frequency domain, e.g. a carrier in FDMA
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/00 : Wireless channel access
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 80/00 : Wireless network protocols or protocol adaptations to wireless operation
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 80/04 : Network layer protocols, e.g. mobile IP [Internet Protocol]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 80/06 : Transport layer protocols, e.g. TCP [Transport Control Protocol] over wireless transmission control protocol/Internet protocol [TCP/IP] or user datagram protocol [UDP] H04L69/16
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/06 : Airborne or Satellite Networks space-based or airborne stations H04B7/185

Abstract

A packet-centric wireless system includes: a wireless base station communicating via a transmission control protocol/internet protocol (TCP/IP) to a first data network; one or more host workstations communicating via TCP/IP to the first data network; one or more subscriber customer premise equipment (CPE) stations coupled with the wireless base station over a shared bandwidth via TCP/IP over a wireless medium; and one or more subscriber workstations coupled via TCP/IP to each of the subscriber CPE stations over a second network. The system can allocate shared bandwidth among the subscriber CPE stations to optimize end-user quality of service (QoS). The first data network includes at least one of: a wireline network; a wireless network; a local area network (LAN); and a wide area network (WAN). The second network includes at least one of: a wireline network; a wireless network; a local area network (LAN); and a wide area network (WAN).

Claims

1. A method for a media access control (MAC) layer of a wireless communication device, the method comprising:

receiving, at the MAC layer, a transmission control protocol (TCP) packet from a source device over a wired network;

transmitting, from the MAC layer, the TCP packet on a wireless network toward a destination device;

responsive to a second TCP packet received from the destination device, determining at the MAC layer based on a TCP header of the second TCP packet that the second TCP packet is a TCP retransmission request from the destination devices;

responsive to the TCP retransmission request from the destination device, determining, at the MAC layer, whether the TCP retransmission request is due to bit errors or congestion experienced by the transmitted TCP packet;

responsive to the MAC layer determining that the TCP retransmission request is due to congestion experienced by the transmitted TCP packet, generating and sending, from the MAC layer, a TCP retransmission request to the source device; and

responsive to the MAC layer determining that the TCP retransmission request is due to bit errors experienced by the transmitted TCP packet, the MAC layer;

intercepting the TCP retransmission request that the destination device transmitted to the source device;

preventing the TCP retransmission request from being received by the source device;

retransmitting the TCP packet on the wireless network to the destination device without invoking TCP retransmission of the TCP packet from the source device to the destination device; and

transmitting a TCP packet receipt acknowledgement for the TCP packet to the source device before the source device detects a lost packet and initiates retransmission.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein said transmitting the TCP packet receipt acknowledgment comprises transmitting the TCP packet receipt acknowledgment before the source device resets transmission rates for TCP packets.

6. The method as recited in claim 1 further comprising detecting, with the MAC layer, that loss of the TCP packet on the wireless network is due to congestion in response to the MAC layer detecting that a received TCP acknowledgment message is not a duplicate TCP acknowledgement message from the wireless network.

7. The method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

retransmitting the TCP packet from the MAC layer a plurality of times;

detecting, with the MAC layer, that a number of retransmissions reaches a threshold; and

requesting, with the MAC layer via the wired network, that the source device retransmit the TCP packet responsive to detecting that the number reaches the threshold.

3. A method for a media access control (MAC) layer of a wireless communication device, the method comprising:

receiving, with the MAC layer, a transmission control protocol (TCP) packet from a source device over a wired network;

transmitting, from the MAC layer, the TCP packet on a Wireless network toward a destination device;

detecting at the MAC layer whether a TCP header for a second TCP packet received from the destination device includes a TCP acknowledgement message that is a duplicate TCP acknowledgment message;

responsive to the MAC layer detecting that the TCP acknowledgment message of the second TCP packet is not a duplicate acknowledgment message, forwarding the TCP acknowledgment message from the MAC layer to the source device;

responsive to the MAC layer detecting that the TCP acknowledgment message of the second TCP package is a duplicate message, determining, with the MAC layer, whether the TCP packet Was successfully transmitted to the destination device;

responsive to the MAC layer determining that that TCP packet was successfully transmitted to the destination device, forwarding the TCP acknowledgment message from the MAC layer to the source device; and

responsive to the MAC layer determining that the TCP packet was not successfully transmitted to the destination device, the MAC layer;

intercepting the received TCP acknowledgment message from the destination device;

preventing the received TCP acknowledgment message from being sent to the source device;

retransmitting the TCP packet on the wireless network from the MAC layer to the destination device prior to a TCP layer of the wireless communication device detecting a loss of the TCP packet; and

transmitting a TCP packet receipt acknowledgement for the TCP packet from the MAC layer to the source device to prevent the source device from detecting a lost packet and initiating retransmission and resetting transmission rates for packets.

11. The method of claim 3 wherein said transmitting a TCP packet receipt acknowledgment comprises transmitting the TCP packet receipt acknowledgment before the source device resets transmission rates for packets.

12. The method as recited in claim 3, further comprising:

retransmitting the TCP packet from the MAC layer a plurality of times;

detecting, with the MAC layer, that a number of retransmissions reaches a threshold; and

requesting, with the MAC layer via the wired network, that the source device retransmit the TCP packet responsive to detecting that the number reaches the threshold.

4. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium configured to store a plurality of instructions which, when executed on a device that is configured to communicate over a wireless network, cause a media access control (MAC) layer of the device to:

receive a transmission control protocol (TCP) packet from a source device over a wired network;

transmit the TCP packet on the wireless network toward a destination device;

detect, based on a TCP header for a second TCP packet received from the destination device, whether loss of the TCP packet on the wireless network is due to bit errors or congestion experienced by the TCP packet;

responsive to detecting the loss is due to congestion, forward a TCP retransmission request of the second TCP packet from destination device to the source device; and

responsive to detecting the loss is due to bit errors,

intercept the TCP retransmission request of the second TCP packet from the destination device to the source device to prevent the TCP retransmission request from being received by the source device;

retransmit the TCP packet on the wireless network from the MAC layer to the destination device without invoking TCP retransmission of the TCP packet from the source device to the destination device; and

transmit a TCP packet receipt acknowledgement for the TCP packet to the source device before the source device detects a lost packet and initiates retransmission.

5. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 4 wherein the plurality of instructions further cause the MAC layer to transmit the TCP packet receipt acknowledgement before the source device resets transmission rates for packets.

8. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium as recited in claim 4, wherein the plurality of instructions further cause the MAC layer to detect the loss of the TCP packet on the wireless network based on a duplicate TCP acknowledgement packet from the wireless network and an examination of the duplicate TCP acknowledgement packet to determine that the duplicate TCP acknowledgement packet indicates the loss of the TCP packet.

9. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium as recited in claim 8, wherein the plurality of instructions further cause the MAC layer to forward a second duplicate TCP acknowledgement packet to the source device on the wired network to invoke the source device to retransmit the TCP packet.

10. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium as recited in claim 4, wherein the plurality of instructions further cause the MAC layer to:

retransmit the TCP packet a plurality of times;

detect that a number of retransmissions reaches a threshold; and

request the source device via the wired network to retransmit the TCP packet responsive to detecting that the number reaches the threshold.