Provisioning based on application and device capability

• US 8,958,780 B2
• Filed: 10/07/2010
• Issued: 02/17/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 10/07/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. (Huawei Investment & Holding Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Smith, Christopher David, Parry, Thomas Owen, Carter, Jason Lee, Clarke, David, Omar, Salim Hayder, Ferrazzini, Axel, Alfano, Nicholas Patrick
• Primary Examiner(s): Nealon, William
• Application Number:
  US12/900,263
• Publication Number:
  US 20120088540A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,594 Days
• Field of Search: 455/550.1
• US Class Current: 455/414.3
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/303 Terminal profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/50 Service provisioning or reconfiguring
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/24 Transfer of terminal data

Abstract

A user equipment (UE) is disclosed comprising an agent configured to monitor and report UE configuration and capability information, wherein the UE is further configured to provide the UE configuration and capability information, and subsequently receive an application based on the configuration and capability information. Also disclosed is a network comprising a provisioning server configured to receive UE configuration and capability information, and subsequently provide an application based on the UE configuration and capability information. Also disclosed is a method comprising providing UE configuration and capability information from a UE, and receiving an application at the UE based on the configuration and capability information. Also disclosed is a method comprising receiving UE configuration and capability information at a provisioning server, and providing an application from the provisioning server based on the UE configuration and capability information.

Claims

1. A user equipment (UE), comprising:

an agent executable by a processor and configured to monitor and send UE configuration and capability information indicating at least one change to the UE,

wherein the UE is configured to subsequently receive an offer to download an application provisioned for the UE based on the UE configuration and capability information, wherein the offer is only received if the application is supported by the UE,

wherein the application was not supported by the UE before the at least one change,

wherein the agent is further configured to send updated UE configuration and capability information, and

wherein at least one service previously provisioned for the UE is subsequently un-provisioned if the updated UE configuration and capability information indicates a loss of service rights for the UE.

2. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is sent in a plurality of reports that comprise a plurality of Service Class Maps.

3. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is sent in a plurality of reports in a plurality of Extensible Markup Language (XML) documents.

4. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises software including libraries and applications that are installed on the UE and executable by a processor.

5. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises hardware details including the UE'"'"'s available communications transport.

6. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises the UE'"'"'s operating system (OS) version and firmware information including device drivers.

7. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises the UE'"'"'s available services that are provided by a carrier and extensions to existing services.

8. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises changes to the UE'"'"'s user billing plan changes and access rights.

9. The UE of claim 1, wherein the UE determines to send the UE configuration and capability information on at least one of a periodic basis, a non-periodic basis, or upon a change to the UE configuration and capability information.

31. The UE of claim 1, wherein the application is one of a new application to be installed on the UE, or an updated version of an existing application on the UE.

10. A network component comprising:

a provisioning server configured to receive user equipment (UE) configuration and capability information indicating at least one change to a UE, and further configured such that upon determining that the at least one change enables the UE to support an application that was not supported by the UE before the at least one change, the provisioning server sends the UE an offer to download the application;

an agent executable by a processor and configured to request the UE configuration and capability information from the UE; and

a plurality of deployed service discovery systems that analyze the UE configuration and capability information and provision accordingly a plurality of services,

wherein the agent is further configured to receive updated UE configuration and capability information from the UE, wherein the plurality of deployed service discovery systems analyze the updated UE configuration and capability information and unprovision at least one of the previously provisioned services if the updated UE configuration and capability information indicates a loss of service rights for the UE.

11. The network component of claim 10, wherein the provisioning server comprises:

an agent executable by a processor and configured to receive the UE configuration and capability information; and

an operation, management, and administration (OMA) device management server that analyzes the UE configuration and capability information and provisions accordingly the application.

12. The network component of claim 10, wherein the provisioning server receives the UE configuration and capability information and provisions the application using a protocol for application discovery, service discovery, capability discovery, or combinations thereof.

13. The network component of claim 10, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is received in a plurality of reports that comprise a plurality of Service Class Maps.

14. The network component of claim 10, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is received in a plurality of reports in a plurality of Extensible Markup Language (XML) documents.

15. The network component of claim 10, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises software including libraries and applications that are installed on the UE and executable by a processor.

16. A method comprising:

sending, from an agent on a user equipment (UE), UE configuration and capability information indicating at least one change to the UE; and

receiving, at the UE, an offer to download an application provisioned for the UE based on the UE configuration and capability information, wherein the offer is only received if the application is supported by the UE, and wherein the application was not supported by the UE before the at least one change; and

sending, from the agent, updated UE configuration and capability information, wherein at least on service previously provisioned for the UE is subsequently un-provisioned if the updated UE configuration and capability information indicates a loss of service rights for the UE.

17. The method of claim 16 further comprising:

monitoring the UE configuration and capability information at the UE;

combining the UE configuration and capability information in one or more reports;

sending the one or more reports to provide the UE configuration and capability information to a provisioning server that determines if the application is supported by the UE; and

downloading the application that is provisioned based on the UE configuration and capability information.

18. The method of claim 16 further comprising:

maintaining the UE configuration and capability information on the UE; and

updating the UE configuration and capability information when a new application is downloaded on the UE.

19. The method of claim 16, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is sent upon a user request to download an application on the UE.

20. The method of claim 16, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is sent upon receiving a notification from a provisioning server that decides whether to provision the application for the UE.

21. The method of claim 16, wherein the UE configuration and capability information is sent via a session initiation protocol (SIP) message.

22. The method of claim 16, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises software including libraries and applications that are installed on the UE and executable by a processor.

23. The method of claim 16, wherein the UE determines to send the UE configuration and capability information on at least one of a periodic basis, a non-periodic basis, and upon a change to the UE configuration and capability information.

24. A method comprising:

receiving, at a provisioning server, user equipment (UE) configuration and capability information indicating at least one change to a UE;

determining, by the provisioning server, that the at least one change enables the UE to support an application;

sending, from the provisioning server, an offer to download the application on the UE, wherein the application was not capable of properly executing on the UE before the at least one change; and

provisioning the application based on the UE capability and configuration information before sending the application.

25. The method of claim 24 further comprising:

receiving, at the provisioning server, a plurality of reports that comprise the UE configuration and capability information.

26. The method of claim 24 further comprising:

adding the application to a list of provisioned application/updates associated with a UE.

27. The method of claim 24 further comprising:

pushing an unsolicited application update that is provisioned based on the UE configuration and capability information to the UE, wherein pushing the unsolicited application update occurs upon if changes to the UE enable an update to an existing application on the UE.

28. The method of claim 24 further comprising:

announcing, to the UE, a new an application that is provisioned based on the UE configuration and capability information.

29. The method of claim 24 further comprising:

adding a UE identifier (ID) to a list of UE IDs that is associated with an application that is provisioned based on the UE capability and configuration information.

30. The method of claim 24, wherein the UE configuration and capability information comprises software including libraries and applications that are installed on the UE and executable by a processor.