Wireless mesh architecture

• US 9,100,990 B2
• Filed: 09/24/2013
• Issued: 08/04/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 02/09/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intellectual Ventures II LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Original Assignee: Piccata Fund Limited Liability Company (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Inventors: Backes, Floyd
• Primary Examiner(s): Kizou, Hassan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Shand, Roberta A
• Application Number:
  US14/035,255
• Publication Number:
  US 20140022948A1
• Time in Patent Office: 679 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/10 Connection setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks

Abstract

A wireless mesh network architecture includes a plurality of wireless nodes, with each wireless node in the network is connected to every other wireless node in the network. Each pair of wireless nodes is coupled by a link dedicated to exchange of data by the pair of nodes. The link is characterized by an agreement between two end points of the link to rendezvous for the purposes of exchanging data at a predetermined time over a predetermined channel. Methods of negotiating rendezvous characteristics, such as rendezvous channel, time, frequency, duration and transmission power ensure that the selected link is tuned to minimize interference and power usage in the WN. A handshake mechanism enables high performance data delivery with minimal packet loss. The link based architecture uses Link State Advertisements, traffic tags and spanning trees to fine tune packet flow through divergent devices in the network.

Claims

1. A method of establishing a wireless network communication channel from a first end point, the method comprising:

negotiating from the first end point a rendezvous with another endpoint to select at least one rendezvous channel and at least one rendezvous temporal characteristic of the link; and

storing the at least one rendezvous channel and at least one rendezvous duration temporal characteristic at the first end point;

wherein the negotiating to select the at least one rendezvous duration temporal characteristic comprises, at the first end point;

selecting a desired rendezvous duration;

receiving a proposed rendezvous duration; and

selecting, as a rendezvous duration of the link, the greater of the desired rendezvous duration and the proposed rendezvous duration; and

wherein the at least one rendezvous temporal characteristic further includes a rendezvous time.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the at least one rendezvous temporal characteristic includes a rendezvous length.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the rendezvous is defined as a polling interval of a mesh network transmission window.

4. The method according to claim 3, wherein the rendezvous comprises multiple polling intervals of the mesh transmission window.

5. The method according to claim 1, further comprising of the first end point broadcasting a cost for the link to other end points in the network to control utilization of the link during routing of packets in the network.

6. The method according to claim 5, wherein the cost is communicated as part of a link state advertisement periodically broadcast.

7. A method of establishing a wireless network communication channel from a first end point, the method comprising:

negotiating from the first end point a rendezvous with another endpoint to select at least one rendezvous channel and at least one rendezvous temporal characteristic of the link; and

storing the at least one rendezvous channel and at least one rendezvous temporal characteristic at the first end point;

wherein selecting a rendezvous channel comprises, at the first endpoint;

calculating an adjacency vector sum characterizing a density of wireless nodes near the first endpoint;

receiving an adjacency vector sum of the another endpoint; and

selecting the rendezvous channel in response to the adjacency vector sum of the first end point being higher than the received adjacency vector sum of at the other endpoint.

8. The method according to claim 7, wherein selecting the rendezvous channel further comprises selecting a channel having minimal interference for a given rendezvous time and rendezvous duration.

9. The method according to claim 7, wherein the at least one rendezvous temporal characteristic is at least a rendezvous time and a rendezvous length.

10. The method according to claim 7, wherein the rendezvous is defined as a polling interval of a mesh network transmission window.

11. The method according to claim 10, wherein the rendezvous comprises multiple polling intervals of the mesh transmission window.

12. The method according to claim 7, further comprising broadcasting a cost for the link from the first end point to other end points in the network to control utilization of the link during routing of packets in the network.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the cost is communicated as part of a link state advertisement periodically broadcast.

14. A wireless end node, comprising:

a link table for storing rendezvous information associated with a link; and

a rendezvous controller, coupled to the link table, for controlling transmissions to another wireless end node over the link; and

a node map, coupled to the rendezvous controller, for storing identifiers and adjacency vector sums associated with at least another wireless node in the network,

wherein the wireless end node is coupled to the another wireless end node in a network by a dedicated link, wherein the dedicated link is established based on an agreement between the wireless end node and the another wireless node to rendezvous for the purposes of exchanging data at a predetermined time over a predetermined channel.

15. The wireless end node of claim 14, wherein the rendezvous controller further comprises logic for controlling negotiation of rendezvous information between the wireless end node and another wireless end node associated with the link.

16. The wireless end node of claim 15, wherein the rendezvous controller uses adjacency vector sum information in the node map to select a channel for the rendezvous.

17. The wireless end node of claim 14, further comprising data exchange protocol logic for managing packet transfer during the rendezvous.

18. The wireless end node of claim 14, further comprising logic for identifying costs of the link in the link table.

19. The wireless end node of claim 18, wherein the costs stored in the link table are enabled to be programmed by the wireless end node to preclude routing through the wireless end node.

20. The wireless end node of claim 18, wherein the costs stored in the link table are obtained in response to link state advertisements received at the wireless node.