Patent EP0872979A2 successfully refreshed from Google Patents.
EP0872979A2
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EP
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System and method for monitoring performance of wireless lan and dynamically adjusting its operating parameters
Assignee: Advanced Micro Devices Inc
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Filing: 1998-01-21
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Granted: —
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Expires: 2018-01-21
Abstract
Abstract A station in the WLAN monitors each transmitted frame to determine whether the frame transmission was protected by an existing outstanding airtime reservation. If a frame is transmitted without an airtime reservation and no response frame is received, the station assumes that the transmission failed due to contention, and monitors the number of contention attempts made to transmit each frame, and the number of failures to receive an acknowledgement. Based on this information, the station dynamically adjusts an RTS/CTS threshold used to determine whether or not an RTS/CTS exchange mechanism should be enabled. If a frame is transmitted during a time interval protected by an outstanding airtime reservation and no response frame is received, the station assumes that the transmission failed due to a bit error, and monitors the number of bit error rate (BER) attempts made to transmit each frame, and the number of BER failures to receive an acknowledgement. Based on this information, the station dynamically adjusts a fragmentation threshold used to determine whether or not a data frame fragmentation mechanism should be enabled.
Inventors
- 👤 Matthew J. Fisher
- 👤 William F. Kern
Bibliographic Details
Application Number
—
Jurisdiction
EP
Data Source
google_patents
Last Synchronized
2026-10-26 20:00
CPC Classifications
H; H04; H04L; H04L1/00; H04L1/0001; H04L1/0006; H04L1/0007; H04L1/0015; H04L1/0019; H04L1/0021
Claims Analysis
Total Claims: 15
Claim 1
Independent Claim
91 words
A controller for a wireless local area
network (WLAN), comprising: a data processing unit arranged at a transmitting
station for supplying frames to be transmitted to a
destination station and receiving acknowledgements
that the frames are received by the destination
station, and a control unit responsive to said data processing
unit for monitoring the number of attempts made to
transmit each frame and the number of failures to
receive an acknowledgement in response to transmission
of the frame, to dynamically control transmission of
airtime reservation requests sent to the destination
station.
Claim 2
Dependent Claim
28 words
The controller of claim 1, wherein said
control unit is responsive to said data processing
unit for dynamically controlling fragmentation of data
frames sent to the destination station.
Claim 3
Dependent Claim
31 words
The controller of claim 2, wherein said
control unit is responsive to said data processing
unit for determining whether an airtime reservation is
provided for transmission of each of the frames.
Claim 4
Dependent Claim
64 words
The controller of claim 3, wherein said
control unit is adapted for dynamically adjusting a
threshold level for transmission of the airtime
reservation requests to the destination station based
on the number of attempts made to transmit a frame to
the destination station and the number of failures to
receive an acknowledgement, when the airtime
reservation is not provided for transmission of the
frame.
Claim 5
Dependent Claim
63 words
The controller of claim 3, wherein said
control unit is adapted for dynamically adjusting a
threshold level for fragmentation of the data frames
transmitted to the destination station based on the
number of attempts made to transmit a frame to the
destination station and the number of failures to
receive an acknowledgement, when the airtime
reservation is provided for transmission of the frame.
Claim 6
Dependent Claim
58 words
The controller of claim 5, wherein said
control unit is adapted for determining the average
number of attempts made to transmit the frames to
destination stations and the average number of
failures to receive an acknowledgement for the WLAN,
to determine deviation of operating conditions for
each of the destination stations from average
operating conditions for the WLAN.
Claim 7
Dependent Claim
47 words
The controller of claim 6, further comprising
a queuing unit responsive to said control unit for
controlling priorities of the frames sent to the
destination station in accordance with the deviation
of the operating conditions for the destination
station from the average operating conditions for the
WLAN.
Claim 8
Independent Claim
239 words
A method of dynamically adjusting operating
parameters of a WLAN, comprising the steps of: monitoring transmission of each frame to
destination stations in the WLAN, checking whether or not an airtime reservation is
obtained for protecting transmission of each frame, monitoring whether an acknowledgement is received
in response to each transmitted frame, for each destination address of the WLAN,
maintaining a count of contention attempts indicative
of the number of attempts to transmit the frame to
each destination station when no airtime reservation
is available, for each destination address of the WLAN,
maintaining a count of contention failures indicative
of the number of failures to receive the
acknowledgement when no airtime reservation is
available, for each destination address of the WLAN,
producing an airtime reservation threshold level for
transmitting an airtime reservation request before a
data frame if a parameter of the data frame exceeds
the airtime reservation threshold level, incrementing the count of contention attempts for
a first destination address each time when a frame
unprotected by the airtime reservation is transmitted
to a first destination station corresponding to the
first destination address, incrementing the count of contention failures for
the first destination address each time when no
acknowledgement is received in response to the
unprotected frame, and for the first destination address, adjusting the
airtime reservation threshold level in accordance with
the ratio of the incremented count of contention
failures to the incremented count of contention
attempts.
Claim 9
Dependent Claim
198 words
The method of claim 8, further comprising the
steps of: for each destination address of the WLAN,
maintaining a count of protected attempts indicative
of the number of attempts to transmit the frame to
each destination station when the airtime reservation
is available, for each destination address of the WLAN,
maintaining a count of protected failures indicative
of the number of failures to receive the
acknowledgement when the airtime reservation is
available, for each destination address of the WLAN,
producing a fragmentation threshold level for
fragmenting a data frame if a parameter of the data
frame exceeds the fragmentation threshold level, incrementing the count of protected attempts for
the first destination address each time when a frame
protected by the airtime reservation is transmitted to
the first destination station corresponding to the
first destination address, incrementing the count of protected failures for
the first destination address each time when no
acknowledgement is received in response to the
protected frame, and adjusting the fragmentation threshold level for
providing fragmentation of data frames to be
transmitted to the first destination station in
accordance with the ratio of the incremented count of
protected failures to the incremented count of
protected attempts.
Claim 10
Dependent Claim
80 words
The method of claim 9, further comprising the
steps of: determining an average count of contention
attempts and an average count of contention failures
for the WLAN, modifying the average counts of contention
attempts and contention failures based on the
incremented counts of contention attempts and
contention failures, and adjusting an average airtime reservation
threshold level for the WLAN in accordance with the
ratio of the modified average count of contention
failures to the modified average count of contention
attempts.
Claim 11
Dependent Claim
44 words
The method of claim 10, further comprising
the step of comparing the adjusted airtime reservation
threshold level for the first destination address with
the adjusted average airtime reservation threshold
level to control priority of a frame to be sent to the
first destination station.
Claim 12
Dependent Claim
79 words
The method of claim 11, further comprising
the steps of: determining an average count of protected
attempts and an average count of protected failures
for the WLAN, modifying the average counts of protected
attempts and protected failures based on the
incremented counts of protected attempts and protected
failures, and adjusting an average fragmentation threshold
level for the WLAN in accordance with the ratio of the
modified average count of protected failures to the
modified average count of protected attempts.
Claim 13
Dependent Claim
42 words
The method of claim 12, further comprising
the step of comparing the adjusted fragmentation
threshold level for the first destination address with
the adjusted average fragmentation threshold level to
control priority of a frame to be sent to the first
destination station.
Claim 14
Dependent Claim
143 words
A controller for a wireless communication
station, comprising: first means for monitoring transmission of frames
to destination stations, second means for determining whether or not an
airtime reservation is obtained for protecting
transmission of the frames, third means for determining whether
acknowledgements are received in response to the
transmitted frames, fourth means responsive to said first, second and
third means for maintaining a count of protected
attempts indicative of the number of attempts to
transmit the frames to the destination station when
the airtime reservation is available, fifth means responsive to said first, second and
third means for maintaining a count of protected
failures indicative of the number of failures to
receive the acknowledgements when the airtime
reservation is available, and first control means responsive to said fourth and
fifth means for controlling fragmentation of data to
be transmitted to the destination stations.
Claim 15
Dependent Claim
101 words
The controller of claim 14, further
comprising: sixth means responsive to said first, second and
third means for maintaining a count of unprotected
attempts indicative of the number of attempts to
transmit the frames to the destination station when no
airtime reservation is available, seventh means responsive to said first, second
and third means for maintaining a count of unprotected
failures indicative of the number of failures to
receive the acknowledgements when no airtime
reservation is available, and second control means responsive to said sixth and
seventh means for enabling airtime reservation
requests before transmitting the data to the
destination stations.
References Cited (Backward Citations)
No citation records indexed.
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