Method and apparatus for allocating bearer resources

• US 9,119,183 B2
• Filed: 10/12/2010
• Issued: 08/25/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 06/04/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ZTE Corporation
• Original Assignee: ZTE Corporation
• Inventors: Guo, Jing
• Primary Examiner(s): Patel, Parth
• Application Number:
  US13/643,179
• Publication Number:
  US 20130064078A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,778 Days
• Field of Search: 370/230, 370/252, 370/229, 370/315, 370/329, 370/331, 370/230.1, 370/236, 370/232, 709/228, 709/227, 709/229, 455/450, 455/452.1, 455/452.2, 455/404.1, 455/458
• US Class Current: 1/1
• 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 72/0453 Resources in frequency domain, e.g. a carrier in FDMA
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/21 in the uplink direction of a wireless link, i.e. towards the network
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/23 in the downlink direction of a wireless link, i.e. towards a terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/15 Setup of multiple wireless link connections

Abstract

The invention discloses a method and apparatus for allocating bearer resources, and relates to LTE system in the communication field. The method comprises: when a network side receives a bearer resource allocation request initiated by a user, if the number of currently activated EPS bearers has reached or exceeded a set upper limit, the network side searching the currently activated EPS bearers according to a QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request, and if an EPS bearer corresponding to a QCI consistent with the QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request is found, performing a proprietary bearer modification operation on the found EPS bearer to respond to the bearer resource allocation request.

Claims

1. A method for allocating bearer resources comprising:

a network side storing Evolved Packet System (EPS) bearer information corresponding to all currently activated EPS bearers in advance, wherein the EPS bearer information including bearer identifiers, QoS Class Identifiers (QCIs), current bearer states and priorities corresponding to the currently activated EPS bearers;

when the network side receives a bearer resource allocation request initiated by a user, and a count of currently activated EPS bearers has reached or exceeded a set upper limit, the network side searching the currently activated EPS bearers according to a QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request;

when the network side does not find any EPS bearer corresponding to the QCI consistent with the QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request, the network side searching the EPS bearers according to a priority corresponding to the bearer requested by the bearer resource allocation request;

when an EPS bearer with a priority lower than the priority corresponding to the bearer requested by the bearer resource allocation request is found, the network side obtaining a current bearer state corresponding to the found EPS bearer from the EPS bearer information corresponding to all the currently activated EPS bearers, and performing a proprietary bearer modification operation on the found EPS bearer to respond to the bearer resource allocation request only when the obtained current bearer state is the idle state.

2. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

when finding the EPS bearer corresponding to the QCI consistent with the QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request, the network side determining whether the current bearer state of the found EPS bearer is an idle state, and only if yes, performing the proprietary bearer modification operation on the found EPS bearer to respond to the bearer resource allocation request.

3. The method according to claim 2, further comprising:

after performing the proprietary bearer modification operation, the network side updating and storing the EPS bearer information corresponding to all the currently activated EPS bearers according to an operation result.

4. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

after performing the proprietary bearer modification operation, the network side updating and storing the EPS bearer information corresponding to all the currently activated EPS bearers according to an operation result.

5. An apparatus for allocating bearer resources comprising a processor and a non-transitory computer-readable medium in which a set of processor executable instructions are stored and when the instructions are executed, it causes the processor to perform the steps in following units:

a bearer information storing unit storing Evolved Packet System (EPS) bearer information corresponding to all currently activated EPS bearers, wherein the EPS bearer information including bearer identifiers, QoS Class Identifiers (QCIs) and current bearer states corresponding to the currently activated EPS bearers;

a receiving unit receiving a bearer resource allocation request initiated by a user, and forward the bearer resource allocation request to a bearer allocating unit; and

a bearer allocating unit determining whether a count of currently activated EPS bearers has reached or exceeded a set upper limit after receiving the bearer resource allocation request, and when the count of the currently activated EPS bearers has reached or exceeded the set upper limit, searching an EPS bear in the currently activated EPS bearers according to a QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request;

when an EPS bearer corresponding to the QCI consistent with the QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request is not found, searching an EPS bearer according to a priority corresponding to the bearer requested by the bearer resource allocation request;

when an EPS bearer with a priority lower than the priority corresponding to the bearer requested by the bearer resource allocation request is found, obtaining a current bearer state corresponding to the found EPS bearer from the bearer information storing unit, and performing the proprietary bearer modification operation on the found EPS bearer to respond to the bearer resource allocation request only when the obtained current bearer state is the idle state.

6. The apparatus according to claim 5, wherein

the bearer allocating unit is further configured to, after finding the EPS bearer corresponding to the QCI consistent with the QCI carried in the bearer resource allocation request, obtain the current bearer state of the found EPS bearer from the bearer information storing unit, and perform the proprietary bearer modification operation on the found EPS bearer to respond to the bearer resource allocation request only when the obtained current bearer state is an idle state.

7. The apparatus according to claim 6, wherein

the bearer allocating unit is further configured to update and store the EPS bearer information corresponding to all the currently activated EPS bearers stored in the bearer information storing unit according to an operation result after performing the proprietary bearer modification operation.