Infrastructure equipment, communications device and methods

A method of operating a communications device to receive data from a wireless communications network, the method comprising:

• detecting, from a control channel of a wireless access interface, encoded data units of a plurality of encoded data units into which an error correction encoded control information has been divided;
• and
• decoding the error correction encoded control information by combining the detected encoded data units in accordance with an arrangement of encoded bits of the error correction encoded control information in each encoded data unit of the plurality of encoded data units, wherein
• the plurality of encoded data units into which an error correction encoded control information has been divided are transmitted in accordance with either
• a repeated transmission of one or more sections into which the error correction encoded control information is divided, or
• an incremental redundancy scheme in which each encoded data unit of the plurality of encoded data units includes a different set of encoded bits of the error correction encoded control information and a different redundancy version number according to the incremental redundancy scheme,
• the combining the detected encoded data units includes
• determining whether the error correction encoded control information has been transmitted in accordance with the repeated transmission or the incremental redundancy scheme,
• in a case that the error correction encoded control information has been transmitted in accordance with the incremental redundancy scheme, combining the detected encoded data units in accordance with the incremental redundancy scheme,
• in a case that the error correction encoded control information has been transmitted in accordance with the repeated transmission, combining the encoded data units of the repeated transmission of the one or more sections of the error correction encoded control information in accordance with a chase combining scheme,
• the combining the detected encoded data units in accordance with the incremental redundancy scheme further comprises:
• identifying each encoded data unit of the detected encoded data units from physical resources of the control channel on which the detected encoded data units are detected to determine the redundancy version number of each encoded data unit,
• identifying the arrangement of encoded bits of the error correction encoded control information in each of the detected encoded data units based on the determined redundancy version number, and
• combining the encoded bits from the detected encoded data units in accordance with the incremental redundancy scheme,
• the physical resources comprise a plurality of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbols, and
• the identifying each encoded data unit of the detected encoded data units comprises
• determining a number of the OFDM symbols on which each of the encoded data units were detected, each of the encoded data units having been transmitted on a resource including a corresponding one of the plurality of OFDM symbols of the control channel, and
• identifying the each encoded data unit from the number of the OFDM symbols of the control channel.

A communications device for receiving data from a wireless communications network, the communications device comprising:

• receiver circuitry configured to receive radio signals transmitted via a wireless access interface provided by the wireless communications network;
• and
• controller circuitry configured in combination with the receiver circuitry to
• detect, from a control channel of a wireless access interface, encoded data units of a plurality of encoded data units into which an error correction encoded control information has been divided in accordance with an incremental redundancy scheme;
• and
• decode the error correction encoded control information by combining the detected encoded data units in accordance with an arrangement of encoded bits of the error correction encoded control information in each encoded data unit of the plurality of encoded data units, wherein
• each encoded data unit of the plurality of encoded data units comprises a different set of the encoded bits according to a different redundancy version number of the incremental redundancy scheme,
• the combining the detected encoded data units includes
• identifying each encoded data unit of the detected encoded data units from physical resources of the control channel on which the detected encoded data units are detected to determine the redundancy version of each encoded data unit,
• identifying the arrangement of encoded bits of the error correction encoded control information in each of the detected encoded data units based on the determined redundancy version, and
• combining the encoded bits from the detected encoded data units in accordance with the incremental redundancy scheme,
• the physical resources comprise a plurality of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbols, and
• the identifying each encoded data unit of the detected encoded data units comprises
• determining a number of the OFDM symbols on which each of the encoded data units were detected, each of the encoded data units having been transmitted on a resource including a corresponding one of the plurality of OFDM symbols of the control channel, and
• identifying the each encoded data unit from the number of the OFDM symbols of the control channel.