Real-time rate control mechanism for multi-rate data transmissions in wireless networks
AssigneeAT&T Mobility II LLC
InventorsJose Rodriguez-Sanchez, Derek Hilborn, Eamonn Gormley
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Wireless networks are becoming increasingly heterogeneous in terms of the processing capabilities of network users' receiving equipment. According to embodiments of the invention, in a communications network comprising a plurality of receivers with different data reception rate capabilities, data frames targeted to respective receivers may be transmitted to the receivers in accordance with the respective data reception rate capabilities of the receivers.
Claims19
A transmitter for transmitting data to a plurality of receivers having respective different data rate capabilities, the transmitter comprising:
- a frame buffer configured to store a queue having a plurality of data frames targeted to the plurality of receivers with respective different data reception rate capabilities;
- and
- a frame selector configured to select a data frame from said queue for transmission to a target receiver in the plurality of receivers based on a comparison of a count of transmitted frames per time slot with a data reception rate capability of said target receiver, wherein the data reception rate is represented as a number of frames per time slot.
A machine-readable medium embodied with program instructions for transmitting information, by a transmitter including a frame buffer and a frame selector, to a plurality of receivers having respective different data reception rate capabilities, the program instructions when executed implement a process comprising:
- (i) searching a queue in the frame buffer, the queue comprising a plurality of data frames targeted to a plurality of receivers with respective different data reception rate capabilities;
- and
- (ii) selecting, by the frame selector, a data frame from said queue for transmission to a target receiver based on a comparison of a count of transmitted frames per time slot with a data reception rate capability of said target receiver, wherein the data reception rate is represented as a number of frames per time slot.
A transmitter for transmitting data to a plurality of receivers having respective different data rate capabilities, the transmitter comprising
- a frame buffer configured to store a plurality of data frames targeted to a plurality of receivers with respective different data reception rate capabilities;
- and
- a frame selector configured to select a data frame from said frame buffer for transmission to a target receiver based on a comparison of a count of transmitted frames per time slot with a data reception rate capability represented as a number of frames per time slot of said target receive, the frame selector configured to select a data frame by:
- identifying a data reception rate capability of said target receiver of a data frame in the frame buffer by referencing information in a header of the data frame in the frame buffer;
- if said data reception rate capability of said target receiver is not exceeded by transmitting said buffered data frame within a next consecutive channel resource slot, transmitting said buffered data frame to said target receiver;
- and
- otherwise, searching said frame buffer for a data frame which can be transmitted in said next consecutive channel resource slot without exceeding the data reception rate capability of said target receiver.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.