Usage based accounting for network deployment
AssigneeCable Television Laboratories, Inc.
InventorsVikas Sarawat, Bernard McKibben
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Usage based accounting is contemplated. The usage based accounting may be beneficial in facilitating assessment of data usage for devices connected inside of a network address translator (NAT) or other type of device having limited capabilities to associated data usage with specific user devices.
Claims20
A method of accounting data usage for a community type of wireless network where the wireless network includes a network address translator (NAT) configured to share a public address across a community of user devices, the NAT being configured to translate the public address to private addresses unique to each user device, the method comprising:
- processing a NAT usage report electronically transmitted from the NAT, the NAT usage report listing at least recently active private addresses according to user ID, used port, and usage period;
- processing an inspector usage report electronically transmitted from an inspector, the inspector usage report listing data consumption and usage period for each used port associated with the public address;
- and
- cross-referencing the NAT usage report and the inspector report to electronically generate an accounting of data usage, the accounting listing data consumption and usage period for each user ID.
A non-transitory computer-readable medium having computer-readable code embodied therein for controlling a computing device to electronically facilitate generating data usage when a network includes a network address translator (NAT) configured to share one or more NATed addresses across a plurality of user devices, the NAT being configured to translate the NATed addresses to private addresses unique to each user device, the computer-readable code comprising instructions sufficient for:
- processing a NAT usage report electronically transmitted from the NAT;
- processing an inspector usage report electronically transmitted from an inspector;
- and
- relating the NAT usage report to the inspector usage report to generate an accounting of data usage associated with the user devices.
A networking system comprising:
- a network address translator (NAT) configured to translate a plurality of private addresses to a public address, the private addresses being used to facilitate addressing for a plurality of user devices over a first network inside of the NAT and the public address being used to facilitate addressing for the user device over a second network outside of the NAT, the NAT being further configured to relate user devices to the private address and ports of the NAT used when facilitating addressing within a NAT usage report;
- an inspector configured to detect data usage outside of the NAT over the first network, the inspector being further configured to relate the data usage to ports of the NAT used when facilitating addressing for the user devices within an inspector usage report;
- and
- an accountant configured to relate the NAT usage report and the inspector usage report within an accounting report, the accounting report indicating data usage for each user device.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.