Back to results
US 8,913,629 B2Granted
Managing coexistence on a shared power line medium
AssigneesQualcomm Atheros, Inc., HisiliconTechnologies Ltd., Panasonic Corporation, Spidcom Technologies, STMicroelectronics S.r.l., Gigle Networks Iberia, S.L.
InventorsLawrence W. Yonge, III, Srinivas Katar, William E. Earnshaw, Stefano Galli, Akio Kurobe, Hisao Koga, Nobutaka Kodama, Jose Abad Molina, Oleg Logvinov, Paul Dixon, Olivier Isson
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Within a domain of a master device, devices that share a power line as a communications medium monitor signal detection windows to sense network status. The devices transmit sensed network status to the master device. The master device allocates channel resources based on the network statuses communicated by the devices within the domain.
Claims22
A method of managing coexistence of devices on a shared power line communications medium, the method comprising:
- determining a first signal detection window of a plurality of signal detection windows, the first signal detection window assigned to a first system category of a plurality of system categories, wherein the first signal detection window is a region of time that periodically occurs based on a given number of line cycles of the shared power line communications medium;
- transmitting, within a first field of the first signal detection window, a first signal with a first phase vector;
- transmitting, within a second field of the first signal detection window, a second signal with either the first phase vector or a second phase vector,
- wherein transmission of the first phase vector in both the first field and the second field of the first signal detection window is predefined to indicate presence of at least one device of the first system category and request for partial use of bandwidth of the shared power line communications medium,
- wherein transmission of the first phase vector in the first field of the first signal detection window and the second phase vector in the second field of the first signal detection window is predefined to indicate presence of at least one device of the first system category and request for full use of bandwidth of the shared power line communications medium;
- monitoring the plurality of signal detection windows;
- and
- determining a first network status based on said monitoring the plurality of signal detection windows, wherein the first network status is that at least one device of a second system category of the plurality of system categories is within interference range if a signal is detected within a second signal detection window and that at least one device of a third system category of the plurality of system categories is within interference range if a signal is detected within a third signal detection window of the plurality of signal detection windows.
5 more elements
An apparatus comprising:
- a processor;
- a transmitter;
- a receiver;
- and
- a communications module configured to manage coexistence of the apparatus with a plurality of devices on a shared power line communications medium, wherein the communication module configured to managing coexistence comprises the communications module being configured to,
- determine a first signal detection window of a plurality of signal detection windows, the first signal detection window assigned to a first system category of a plurality of system categories, wherein the apparatus belongs to the first system category and wherein the first signal detection window is a region of time that periodically occurs based on a given number of line cycles of the shared power line communications medium;
- cause the transmitter to transmit, within a first field of the first signal detection window, a first signal with a first phase vector;
- cause the transmitter to transmit, within a second field of the first signal detection window, a second signal with either the first phase vector or a second phase vector,
- wherein transmission of the first phase vector in both the first field and the second field of the first signal detection window is predefined to indicate presence of at least one device of the first system category and request for partial use of bandwidth of the shared power line communications medium,
- wherein transmission of the first phase vector in the first field of the first signal detection window and the second phase vector in the second field of the first signal detection window is predefined to indicate presence of at least one device of the first system category and request for full use of bandwidth of the shared power line communications medium,
- monitor the plurality of signal detection windows via the receiver;
- and
- determine a first network status based on monitoring of the plurality of signal detection windows, wherein the first network status is that at least one device of a second system category of the plurality of system categories is within interference range of the apparatus if a signal is detected within a second signal detection window and that at least one device of a third system category of the plurality of system categories is within interference range of the apparatus if a signal is detected within a third signal detection window of the plurality of signal detection windows.
10 more elements
An apparatus comprising:
- a processor;
- a machine-readable storage media having program instructions stored therein, the program instructions executable by the processor to cause the apparatus to,
- determine a second signal detection window of a plurality of signal detection windows, wherein a first signal detection window of the plurality of signal detection windows corresponds to an access system category, the second signal detection window corresponds to a first in-home system category, and a third signal detection window corresponds to a second in-home system category;
- transmit a first phase vector of a plurality of phase vectors within a first field of the second signal detection window and no phase vector within a second field of the second signal detection window to communicate presence of the apparatus on a shared power line communications medium, wherein transmission of the first phase vector in the first field of the second signal detection window and transmission of no phase vector in a second field of the second signal detection window indicates presence of at least one device of the first in-home system category;
- monitor the plurality of signal detection windows;
- and
- determine a first network status based on monitoring of the plurality of signal detection windows, wherein the first network status is that at least one device of the access system category is within interference range of the apparatus if a second phase vector of the plurality of phase vectors is detected within a first field of the first signal detection window and that at least one device of the second in-home system category is within interference range of the apparatus if a third phase vector of the plurality of phase vectors is detected within a first field of the third signal detection window.
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.