Portable wireless gateway

• US 20040185777A1
• Filed: 02/28/2003
• Published: 09/23/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 02/28/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Lucent Technologies, Inc. (Nokia Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Lucent Technologies, Inc. (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Bryson, Sidney Llewellyn
• Granted Patent: US 7,346,025 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/41.1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2212/00 Encapsulation of packets
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/02 for separating internal from external traffic, e.g. firewalls
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1458 Denial of Service
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/289 Intermediate processing functionally located close to the data consumer application, e.g. in same machine, in same home or in same sub-network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/56 Provisioning of proxy services store-and-forward switching systems in data switching networks H04L12/54
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/565 Conversion or adaptation of application format or content adding application control or application functional data H04L67/561
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/61 taking into account QoS or priority requirements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/62 Establishing a time schedule for servicing the requests
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/00 Network arrangements, protocols or services independent of the application payload and not provided for in the other groups of this subclass networks security protocols H04L9/40; wireless communication networks H04W
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/062 Pre-authentication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/16 Gateway arrangements

Abstract

A portable wireless network gateway aggregates bandwidth demand of different devices operating under different communications protocols. Network connectivity is provided by encapsulating data from the different devices to make the data appear to be data native to a single network. For example, the single network is a cellular wireless network. The different communications protocols include but are not limited to IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.3, USB, cellular wireless protocols, Bluetooth, RS-232, and IEEE 11.1R.

Claims

1. A portable wireless gateway comprising:

at least one access point operative to communicate with user devices;

a transceiver operative to communicate with a network; and

,

a protocol emulator comprising;

a protocol gateway operative to encapsulate user device data relayed by the at least one access point to prepare the user device data for transmission by the transceiver in a protocol associated with a network in communication with the transceiver, and unpackage data from the network relayed by the transceiver for delivery to the at least access point and relaying to at least one of the user devices.

2. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the transceiver comprises

a radio transceiver operative to communicate with a public mobile data network.

3. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to control and coordinate radio frequencies used by the at least one access point.

4. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to assign a private IP address to a user device using network address translation.

5. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to connect to a wireless operator network by presenting the wireless operator network with a gateway ID, connect to a third party service provider via the wireless operator network, authenticate the portable wireless gateway with the third party service provider by presenting the third party service provider with the gateway ID, request an EIN from the third party service provider, receive the EIN from the third party service provider and authenticating services for a user by presenting the EIN to the wireless operator network.

6. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to add a message to data sent to the user device from another source.

7. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 further comprising:

an administration and maintenance module operative to perform billing and security functions in communication with the protocol gateway.

8. The portable wireless gateway of claim 7 wherein the administration and maintenance module is further operative to autonomously communicate with a maintenance server of a third party service provider for uploading billing information and downloading administration and maintenance information.

9. The portable wireless gateway of claim 7 wherein the billing and security functions include at least one of recording connection time of the user device and recording a traffic volume associated with the user device.

10. The portable wireless gateway of claim 7 wherein the protocol gateway and administration module cooperate to provide firewall functionality for the user device.

11. The portable wireless gateway of claim 7 wherein the administration and maintenance module comprises:

a dynamic host configuration protocol server.

12. The portable wireless gateway of claim 7 wherein the administration and maintenance module comprises:

an HTML server operative to supply log on screens for delivery to user devices and to receive and process log on information.

13. The portable wireless gateway of claim 12 wherein the protocol gateway, administration and maintenance module and the HTML server are operative to cooperate to provide a user with temporary access to the services of the portable wireless gateway to allow the user to purchase longer term access to the services of the portable wireless gateway online.

14. The portable wireless gateway of claim 2 wherein the radio transceiver comprises a wireless telephone based broadband communications link.

15. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol gateway is operative to encapsulate data so as to act as a proxy for the user devices.

16. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the at least access point comprises:

an IEEE 802.11 access point.

17. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the at least access point comprises:

a Bluetooth access point.

18. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the at least access point comprises:

a UMTS Node B access point.

19. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the at least access point comprises:

a HiperLan access point.

20. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the transceiver comprises a UMTS based transceiver.

21. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the transceiver comprises a CDMA 2000 based transceiver.

22. The portable wireless gateway of claim 2 wherein the radio transceiver comprises a fixed wireless based communications link.

23. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol emulator further comprises:

a queuing device is operative to queue traffic based on quality of service parameters associated with the traffic.

25. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the at least one access point and the protocol gateway are operative to negotiate a user device handover to or from another portable wireless gateway device when a comparison of a first signal strength between the user device and the at least one access point and a second signal strength between the user device and an access point of the other portable wireless gateway indicates that a handover is warranted.

26. The portable wireless gateway of claim 25 wherein the protocol gateway negotiates the user device handover using a secondary tunnel.

27. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the transceiver is further operative to act as an access point for a cellular wireless device and the protocol gateway and the transceiver are operative to relay traffic between the cellular wireless device and a base station of a cellular wireless network.

28. The portable wireless gateway of claim 1 wherein the protocol gateway and the transceiver cooperate to securely send Internet protocol data via encrypted tunnels of a virtual private network

24. The mobile network gateway of claim 234 wherein the queuing device is operative to prevent denial of service to user devices associated with a high quality of service.

29. An apparatus for aggregating bandwidth demand comprising:

a plurality of respective access points each respective access point of the plurality being operative to communicate with respective user devices using a respective communications protocol of the respective user devices;

a main radio transceiver operative to communicate with a wireless network;

a protocol emulator operative to package data received by the plurality of access points from the respective user devices for transmission by the main radio transceiver to the wireless network, and unpackage data from the main radio transceiver for delivery to the respective user devices through the respective access points.

30. The apparatus for aggregating bandwidth demand of claim 29 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to package data from the respective user devices as digital cellular data, and unpackage digital cellular data from the radio transceiver for consumption by the respective user devices.

31. The apparatus for aggregating bandwidth demand of claim 29 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to emulate at least one digital cellular device to facilitate delivery of user device data to and from a remote digital cellular network base station.

32. The apparatus for aggregating bandwidth demand of claim 29 wherein the protocol emulator is operative to set up tunnels for transporting data between the protocol emulator and a wireless service node of the wireless network.

33. The apparatus for aggregating bandwidth demand of claim 29 wherein the main radio transceiver comprises an access point operative to communicate with an access point of a wireless local area network.

34. A method for providing network connectivity for a plurality of respective user devices, the method comprising:

communicating with each of the respective user devices using respective communications protocols of each respective device;

packaging data from each respective device to make the data appear to be cellular network data; and

,

transmitting the packaged data as cellular telephone data, thereby providing network connectivity.

35. The method for providing network connectivity of claim 34 further comprising:

receiving encapsulated data encapsulated as cellular telephone data;

unpackaging the received cellular telephone data; and

,

delivering the unpackaged data to the respective user devices as indicated by the unpackaged data.

36. The method for providing network connectivity of claim 34 further comprising:

establishing a communications tunnel to a service node and wherein the transmitting comprises transmitting the packaged data via the communications tunnel.

37. The method for providing network connectivity of claim 34 further comprising:

acting as a proxy for the respective user devices.