Determining propagation delay of communications in distributed antenna systems, and related components, systems, and methods

A method of determining a location of a client device in a distributed communications system, comprising:

• distributing downlink radio frequency (RF) signals to one or more remote units among a plurality of remote units over at least one downlink communications medium;
• communicating to one or more of the plurality of remote units to distribute the received downlink RF signals to one or more client devices;
• receiving uplink RF signals from one or more remote units among the plurality of remote units over at least one uplink communications medium, the uplink RF signals coming from a particular one of the one or more client devices;
• determining a propagation delay of the received uplink RF signals from the particular one of the one or more client devices in response to the downlink RF signals using at least one propagation delay measurement circuit;
• and
• determining a location of the particular one of the one or more client devices as a function of determined propagation delay of the received uplink RF signals from the one or more client devices.

A communications system, comprising:

• a distributed communications system, comprising:
• head-end equipment comprising:
• at least one downlink radio frequency (RF) interface configured to receive downlink RF signals from a signal source and distribute the downlink RF signals over at least one downlink communications medium to one or more remote units to be communicated to one or more client devices;
• and
• at least one uplink RF interface configured to receive uplink RF signals over at least one uplink communications medium from the one or more remote units communicated by the one or more client devices to the one or more remote units;
• each of the one or more remote units configured to:
• receive the downlink RF signals from the head-end equipment over the at least one downlink communications medium;
• communicate the received downlink RF signals to the one or more client devices;
• receive the uplink RF signals from the one or more client devices;
• and
• distribute the received uplink RF signals over the at least one uplink communications medium to the head-end equipment;
• at least one propagation delay measurement circuit communicatively coupled to the at least one downlink RF interface and the at least one uplink RF interface, the at least one propagation delay measurement circuit configured to measure propagation delay of the received uplink RF signals from the one or more client devices by the at least one uplink RF interface in response to the downlink RF signals;
• and
• a controller communicatively coupled to the at least one propagation delay measurement circuit, the controller configured to determine a location of the one or more client devices as a function of determined propagation delay of the received uplink RF signals from the one or more client devices.