HK1233795A1 - Harq-ack handling method for unintended downlink sub-frames - Google Patents

Description

HARQ-ACK handling method for unexpected downlink subframe

Background

Long Term Evolution (LTE) and other wireless networks rely on messaging across unreliable media between mobile devices (e.g., User Equipment (UE)) and a Radio Access Network (RAN). In LTE, the RAN consists of one or more enodebs (evolved node bs). This unreliable communication medium may create problems with proper data communication between the RAN and the UE, as data may be lost or corrupted due to low signal quality, interference, or other problems with employing the wireless medium.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a table illustrating a mapping of resources, constellations, and RM code input bits from a HARQ-ACK response to two cells with 3 bundling windows, according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 2 is a table illustrating a mapping of resources, constellations, and RM code input bits from a HARQ-ACK response to two cells with 4 bundling windows, according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 2A is a continuation of the table of fig. 2 according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 3 illustrates a graph of example resource allocations, according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 4 illustrates a chart of example resource allocations, in accordance with some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 5A illustrates a flow diagram of a method of generating a HARQ-ACK response, according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 5B illustrates a flow diagram of a method of processing a HARQ-ACK response, according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 6 illustrates a block diagram of a wireless communication system, in accordance with some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 7 illustrates a functional block diagram showing certain functions of a UE and an eNodeB, according to some examples of the present disclosure.

Fig. 8 illustrates a block diagram of a machine in accordance with some examples of the present disclosure.

Detailed Description

To address unreliable wireless communication mediums, LTE and other cellular networks employ a mechanism known as hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) to provide error correction and packet acknowledgement to ensure secure delivery of data between the RAN and the UE. HARQ provides error correction at the receiver side using forward error correction coding (FEC) and an automatic feedback mechanism (automatic repeat request (ARQ)) to indicate to the transmitter whether a packet has been successfully received. Upon receiving a data packet, the receiver uses an error detection code (e.g., a Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)) to determine whether the packet was received correctly. If the packet is successfully received, the receiver acknowledges the sender using a feedback mechanism (e.g., an ACK). If the packet is not successfully received, the receiver may attempt to repair the packet using the FEC information. The receiver may ACK the sender if it successfully repairs the packet using the FEC information, otherwise the receiver may respond to the sender with a Negative Acknowledgement (NACK). In still other examples, the receiver (UE) may respond that it is in a discontinuous transmission mode (DTX) mode. The DTX response may represent a situation in which the UE cannot properly detect information on a control channel (e.g., primary downlink control channel-PDCCH) and thus cannot determine whether a packet is sent to the UE.

In cellular networks, these HARQ responses are typically transmitted on a control channel. Responses to downlink traffic sent from the RAN to the UE are typically sent in an uplink control channel (e.g., a Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH)). The response to uplink traffic sent from the UE to the RAN is typically sent in a downlink HARQ-ACK channel (e.g., physical hybrid HARQ indicator channel: PHICH). Packets that are not acknowledged (whether NACK or simply not acknowledged at all) may be retransmitted by the transmitter.

In some systems, uplink communications (from the UE to the RAN) are separated from downlink communications in the frequency domain. That is, uplink and downlink wireless communications occur on different frequency bands. These systems are referred to as Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) systems. In other examples, uplink and downlink wireless communications may share the same frequency band, but may be separated in the time domain. That is, frequency bands are reserved for uplink wireless transmissions in some time instances (e.g., referred to as time slots) and downlink wireless communications in other time instances (e.g., time slots). This scheme is called Time Division Duplexing (TDD). In still other examples, a half-duplex FDD (H-FDD) system characterizes uplink and downlink wireless communications as being on different frequency bands but also separated in the time domain.

The true nature of cellular networks is that the communication between the UE and the RAN is asymmetric, favoring the downlink radio link. That is, typically more data is sent from the RAN to the UE than from the UE to the RAN. To compensate for this, the cell planner will often allocate more frequency or time resources (depending on whether the network is FDD or TDD) to downlink wireless communications than to uplink wireless communications.

This resource asymmetry creates problems for UEs trying to manage the necessary HARQ acknowledgements, since the uplink resources on the uplink control channel are often insufficient to transmit these responses. This problem is only exacerbated as multiple carriers and other uplink signaling (e.g., channel state information) increases.

In LTE, wireless transmissions are typically broken down into discrete units called frames, which can then be broken down into subframes and the subframes broken down into one or more codewords. Each codeword may have a mapping relationship with a particular transport block and may be used interchangeably herein (unless otherwise specified). With FDD systems, after receiving a transmission (typically 4 subframes later), the HARQ response may be transmitted with a fixed number of subframes. However, with TDD systems, fixed delays are not possible due to the variable number of uplink and downlink timeslots caused by asymmetric wireless imbalance often in the radio frame.

To address these issues, for TDD systems, several mechanisms have been developed by the third generation partnership project (3 GPP) that promulgates the 4g (lte) wireless network standard. The first is ACK/NACK/DTX time domain bundling. For HARQ-ACK bundling, ACK, NACK, or DTX results for each particular codeword in each downlink subframe of a particular number of subframes (referred to as a bundling window) received on a downlink channel (e.g., physical downlink shared channel-PDSCH) are logically Anded (AND) to produce one or more composite results corresponding to each codeword in all subframes of the bundling window. The number of composite ACK/NACK/DTX results generated is then equal to the number of codewords in the subframe. For example, if the size of the bundling window is four downlink subframes and each subframe has two codewords, the acknowledgments of the first codewords of subframes 0-3 are logically anded together and the second codewords of subframes 0-3 are also logically anded together to produce two acknowledgment bits. The benefit of this technique is that it is very compact, so that very few bits are used so that uplink coverage can be ensured. A drawback is that if any one codeword in any one subframe is not correctly received, the specific codeword for all subframes will be retransmitted. Another technique is to use HARQ-ACK multiplexing, which can logically and the codeword across codewords for each downlink subframe individually (i.e., referred to as spatial domain bundling) to generate one acknowledgement bit for each downlink subframe. The result is an ACK/NACK/DTX result for each associated downlink subframe within the bundling window. For four downlink subframes with two codewords per subframe, spatial domain bundling (if any) across the two codewords by a logical and operation is applied in the subframe and multiple bundled ACKs/NACKs in the subframe may result in one composite state within the bundling window. For HARQ-ACK responses sent on the Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH), the composite state may be represented as a combination of PUCCH resources and constellation points. This results in four acknowledgement results-one per subframe. Note that although the name of this particular HARQ-ACK technique is "multiplexing," the term "bundling window" is used throughout the specification.

A bundling window is a unit of time (e.g., multiple subframes) that specifies when HARQ-ACK feedback corresponding to downlink traffic at a particular uplink subframe is transmitted in the uplink. UE in subframeUsing PUCCH for transmitting HARQ-ACK feedbackWherein(defined in Table 1) and. Bundling window is typically defined for subframesOf uplink HARQ-ACK feedbackThe downlink subframe of (1).

TABLE 1 Downlink association set index for TDD

The TDD UL-DL configuration table is given in table 2.

TABLE 2 TDD UL-DL configurations

TDD uplink/downlink configuration (D = downlink, S = special subframe with three fields DwPTS, GP and UpPTS, which is used to give the UE time to switch from downlink to uplink, U = uplink).

LTE-advanced supports carrier aggregation, where multiple carriers are available in the downlink. This means that a plurality of ACK/NACK information bits for a plurality of carriers need to be fed back in the uplink. For this case, LTE defines a technique referred to as channel selection with time-domain bundling. This technique utilizes a similar technique to HARQ-ACK multiplexing, except that the time-domain bundling of this technique is slightly different from the existing one. Time-domain bundling for carrier aggregation may be used to transmit multiple consecutive ACKs for each component carrier while time-domain bundling for single carrier is used to transmit logically bundled HARQ-ACK information. The resulting ACK/NACK information may be encoded by a joint selection of channels and QPSK constellation symbols. In essence, the multiplexed acknowledgement results may then be indexed to a lookup table to select a two-bit field (QPSK constellation) and PUCCH resources (selected channel) for PUCCH transmission. In case HARQ-ACK is transported on PUSCH, RM code input bit setting is also provided. Mapping tables for different bundling window sizes are shown in fig. 1 and fig. 2 (fig. 2 continues on fig. 2A). The columns labeled HARQ-ACK (0) - (2) of fig. 1 and the columns labeled HARQ-ACK (0) - (3) of fig. 2 and 2A represent the ACK, NACK or DTX decision for that particular subframe for both the primary and secondary cells (PCell and SCell, respectively). For example, in the case of a four subframe bundling window, if subframe (0) (ACK) is successfully received on the primary cell, subframe (1) (NACK) is not successfully received, subframe (2) (ACK) is successfully received, and subframe (3) (ACK) and responses of ACK, NACK on the secondary cell are successfully received, the UE may select a constellation of (0, 1) with a feedback resource corresponding to Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH) 3 and using code input bits of 0, 1. In short, the HARQ-ACK (j) column is the ACK/NACK/DTX response for each particular downlink subframe to be used for each primary and secondary cell (for multiple carriers) and corresponding PUCCH resource, constellation, and RM code input bits depending on the HARQ-ACK (j) selected for each of the primary and secondary cells. This technique utilizes PUCCH format 1b when transmitting HARQ-ACK using PUCCH.

HARQ-ACK bundling or HARQ-ACK multiplexing may not work properly if the UE does not correctly receive scheduling information for any scheduled frame. For example, if the eNodeB schedules two subframes with bundling window size 2 to the terminal, but the UE only receives the last frame, but does not realize that it has been scheduled in the first frame, the UE will reply with an ACK. The eNodeB will interpret this ACK as an acknowledgement of two subframes. To determine when to miss a downlink grant for a UE, the LTE specification provides a Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) that is sent from the RAN to the UE along with downlink scheduling information on the PDCCH. The DAI conveyed in the downlink grant degrades until the cumulative number of PDCCHs of the current subframe with assigned PDSCH transmission and PDCCHs indicating semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release within the same bundling window of each configured serving cell. The UE then generates HARQ-ack (j) within the beamforming window using the DAI.

Turning now to FIG. 3, an example response calculation is shown. In the example of fig. 3, four subframes are shown in two configured cells: (M=4) The beaming window of (1). HARQ-ACK of Primary cell (PCell) ((PCell))j) The response is ACK, DTX, ACK and it is ACK, NACK, ACK, respectively, in the secondary cell (SCell). The DAI received on the PDCCH of the PCell is 1 for subframe 0, 2 for subframe 1, and 4 for subframe 3. Note that the UE cannot decode the PDCCH on subframe 2 (m = 2) and therefore does not update its DAI value. Even if the UE loses the updated DAI value, it recovers the DAI value in subframe m =3 and thus knows that the DAI is 4 at the end of the bundling window. Since the DAI value is 4, the UE knows that it needs four HARQ-ACKs: (j) And (6) responding. For SCell, the DAI received on PDCCH is 1, 2, 3, and 4 for subframes 0, 1, 2, and 3, respectively.

Based on the mapping tables in fig. 2 and 2A, this produces a response:

note that there is a problem when the RAN does not schedule all subframes of a particular bundling window. Since some frames are not scheduled, the DAI will not increment and will be smaller than the bundling window size at the end of the bundling window. The feedback tables of fig. 1 and 2 assume that all frames are scheduled. Fig. 4 shows an example of this problem. The first two downlink subframes in PCell are not scheduled in this example. Thus for subframe 2, DAI is 1, and for subframe 3, DAI is 2 (compare to fig. 3, where DAI is 3 and 4 for subframes 2 and 3, respectively). Since HARQ-ACK is determined in conjunction with the DAI value: (j) So HARQ-ACK (0) corresponds to subframe 2 and HARQ-ACK (1) corresponds to subframe 3. However, HARQ-ACK (2) and HARQ-ACK (3) are undefined since there are no corresponding DAI values of 3 and 4 within the bundling window according to the definition of DAI. This is because the DAI value is defined as the cumulative number of PDCCHs within the assigned PDSCH transmission and PDCCHs indicating a semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release up to the current subframe within the bundling window. Thus, if there are no expected DL subframes to be monitored by the UE for HARQ-ACKs related to DAI values within the beamforming window (j) Then UE behavior is not specified.

Disclosed in some examples are systems, methods, UEs, and machine-readable media that address the problem of generating acknowledgments for cases in which the last received dai (ldai) value is less than the size of the bundling window. In some examples, forLDAI<=j<M-1 is HARQ-ACK (j) A predetermined state is utilized where M is the multiplexing or bundling window size. For example, DTX states may be padded into these HARQ-ACK responses. Thus, for example, in fig. 4, HARQ-ACK for PCell used to determine appropriate response parameters: (j) The following steps are carried out: ACK, DTX.

Since DTX fills the last two states of PCell, the UE will know the exact mapping to use from the table. Furthermore, on the network side, since the eNodeB already knows to pad the last two states with DTX, irrelevant states other than DTX can be excluded during the PUCCH detection hypothesis test that can improve HARQ-ACK detection performance. For example, in fig. 3, since the HARQ-ACK response in PCell is ACK, DTX, ACK, NACK, DTX, NACK, ACK, DTX, or NACK, DTX, the status of any, any ACK/NACK, ACK/NACK may be excluded from eNB detection. By reducing detection hypothesis testing, PUCCH detection performance may be enhanced.

Applying this method to the example shown in fig. 4 yields:

although in some examples, HARQ-ACK may be padded with DTX for the case where not all downlink subframes within the bundling window are scheduled(s) ((s))j) While in other examples, other values may be used, such as ACK, NACK, or another defined value. This is because the eNodeB has sufficient system knowledge to ignore these values. In fact, in some examples, the UE may arbitrarily select any ACK/NACK/DTX value.

Turning now to fig. 5A, a method 5000 of acknowledging transmissions when all downlink frames in a particular bundling window are not scheduled is shown. At operation 5010, the UE receives scheduling information indicating a scheduled downlink frame on the PDCCH. At operation 5020, the UE determines that it has received the last downlink assignment for a particular bundling window and determines at operation 5030 that the last DAI value (LDAI) is less than the bundling window size. At operation 5040, the UE determines an ACK/NACK/DTX response for the frame (the UE is aware that it is scheduled). At operation 5050, the remaining HARQ-ACKs that do not have a corresponding DAI value are padded with a predetermined value (e.g., DTX) ((j）。

Turning now to fig. 5B, a method 5100 of handling acknowledgements at the eNodeB where transmissions of all downlink frames in a particular bundling window are not scheduled is shown. In operation 5At 110, a base station (e.g., eNodeB) can schedule one or more downlink transmissions for a particular acknowledgement period (e.g., bundling window) and notify a UE over a downlink control channel (e.g., Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH)). At operation 5120, the eNodeB may transmit the scheduled frame. At operation 5130, the eNodeB may receive a response from the UE. At operation 5140, the eNodeB may determine that the last DAI value sent on the PDCCH is less than the bundling window size. In operation 5150, the eNodeB may determine the response using the resources on which the response was received (e.g., PUCCH resources) together with the received constellation and RM code bits, taking into account HARQ-ACK (r: (r) ((r))j) Is a padding value, whereinjIs thatLDAI<=j<M-1, where M is the multiplexing or bundling window size. The eNodeB may then transmit any necessary retransmissions.

Turning now to fig. 6, a system 6000 for acknowledgment transmission is shown. A User Equipment (UE) 6010 communicates with a Radio Access Network (RAN) 6020 over one or more radio links 6040, which radio access network 6020 may include one or more base stations (e.g., enodebs) 6030, 6035. RAN 6020 may be connected to a core network 6045, e.g., an enhanced packet core. EPC 6045 may be connected to a network 6050, such as the Internet, plain old telephone service network (POTS), or the like. In the system of fig. 6, radio link 6040 may operate in a time division duplex mode (TDD) mode.

Fig. 7 shows a partial functional diagram of a UE 7000 (which may contain further components not shown). UE 7000 may include transmit module 7010. The transmitting module 7010 may transmit control and user traffic to the RAN on one or more uplink channels (e.g., Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH), Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH), etc.). The transmitting module 7010 may transmit acknowledgements of user traffic and control traffic sent from the RAN to the UE 7000 on downlink channels, e.g., a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) and a Physical Dedicated Control Channel (PDCCH).

Receiving module 7020 may receive information sent by the RAN on downlink channels (e.g., Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) and Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH)) and inform response module 7030 of the status of receipt of that information. For example, the received subframe may be decoded at the receiving module (and any FEC correction may also be done here) and an indication of whether the subframe should be ACK, NACK or DTX may be sent to the responding module 7030. Receiving module 7020 may also pass various communication parameters (e.g., the size of the bundling window and the last received DAI for that window) to responding module 7030.

Response module 7030 may inform transmission module 7010 of appropriate response parameters (e.g., PUCCH resources, RM code bits, constellation) according to the tables in fig. 1 and 2 (continuing on fig. 2A) based on LDAI, bundling window size, etc. For example, response module 7030 may make a determination that the number of received downlink assignments is less than the response bundling window size and, based on that determination, set a reception status for each received downlink assignment based on whether frames associated with the particular received downlink assignment were successfully received and set a reception status for frames in the bundling window that do not have a corresponding downlink assignment to a predetermined value. For example, if one or more received Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) values are equal toj + pThe response module may determine each index for responding to a plurality of downlink subframes in a bundling windowj. In response to determining that one of the one or more DAI values is equal toj + pDetermining to correspond tojThe reception status of the subframe (ACK/NACK/DTX). In response to determining that none of the one or more DAI values is equal toj + pWill correspond tojThe reception state of the subframe of (a) is set to a predetermined value. WhereinpIs a constant (e.g., 0 or 1), wherein one or more DAI values are received on a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH), whereinj≤M-1, and whereinMIs the number of subframes in the HARQ bundling window. The response module 7030 may also be referred to as a HARQ module and may then instruct the transmitting module 7010 to transmit an appropriately determined response. In some examples, if there is a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) transmission on a primary cell without detection within a bundling windowCorresponding PDCCH, then variablepCan be equal to zero, otherwisepMay be one. Thus, valuepMay indicate whether a semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) PDSCH without a corresponding PDCCH is present within the beamforming window. Note that although the description describes the PDCCH with a DAI value for the scheduled downlink frame, the disclosure may also be used when the UE receives a PDCCH indicating a downlink semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release message, which also contains a DAI value.

Fig. 7 also shows a partial functional diagram of eNodeB7100 (which may contain more components not shown). The eNodeB7100 includes a transmit module 7110, which transmit module 7110 transmits user data and control data over one or more channels. For example, user data or control data may be transmitted on a Physical Dedicated Control Channel (PDCCH) or a Physical Dedicated Shared Channel (PDSCH). Transmit module 7110 may schedule frames for transmission and signal to the UE on the PDCCH. The transmitting module 7110 may also transmit the DAI in the PDCCH. The receiving module 7120 may receive control and user data on uplink communication channels, e.g., Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH) and Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH). Receiving module 7120 may receive a HARQ response (e.g., an ACK-NACK-DTX response) from the UE for the downlink subframe. In response to this information, the receiving module may indicate to the transmitting module that some data may need to be retransmitted. The receiving module 7120 may decode the response based on determining on which PUCCH resource the response was received, the received constellation bits, and the received RM code. Receiving module 7120 may also determine that the last DAI value in the bundling window is less than the number of subframes in the bundling window and one or more of the ACK/NACK/DTX of the subframes should be ignored as not representing an actual transmission.

Fig. 8 illustrates a block diagram of an example machine 8000 based on which any one or more of the techniques discussed herein (e.g., methods) may be performed. The UE, RAN (including eNodeB), or EPC may be machine 8000 or a part including machine 8000. In alternative embodiments, machine 8000 may operate as a standalone device or may be connected (e.g., networked) to other machines. In a networked deployment, the machine 8000 may operate in the capacity of a server machine, a client machine, or both server and client network environments. In an example, the machine 8000 may function as a peer machine in a peer-to-peer (P2P) (or other distributed) network environment. The machine 8000 may be a Personal Computer (PC), a tablet PC, a set-top box (STB), a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), a mobile telephone (e.g., a UE), a network appliance, a wireless base station, a network router, switch or bridge, or any machine capable of executing instructions (sequential or otherwise) that specify actions to be taken by that machine. Additionally, while only a single machine is illustrated, the term "machine" shall also be taken to include any collection of machines that individually or jointly execute a set (or multiple sets) of instructions to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein, such as cloud computing, software as a service (SaaS), other computer cluster configurations. For example, the functions of machine 8000 may be distributed across multiple other machines in a network.

Examples as described herein may include or may operate on logic or multiple components, modules, or mechanisms. A module is a tangible entity capable of performing certain operations and may be configured or arranged in a certain manner. In an example, a circuit may be arranged (e.g., internally or with respect to external entities (e.g., other circuits)) as a module in a prescribed manner. In an example, all or part of one or more computer systems (e.g., a stand-alone client or server computer system) or one or more hardware processors may be configured by firmware or software (e.g., instructions, application portions, or applications) as a module that operates to perform specified operations. In an example, the software may reside (1) on a non-transitory machine readable medium or (2) in a transmission signal. In an example, software, when executed by underlying hardware of a module, causes the hardware to perform specified operations.

Thus, the term "module" is understood to encompass a tangible entity, either a physically constructed, specifically configured (e.g., hardwired), or temporarily (e.g., temporarily) configured (e.g., programmed) entity to operate in a prescribed manner or to perform some or all of any of the operations described herein. Considering the example where modules are temporarily configured, each module need not be instantiated at any one time. For example, where the modules comprise a general purpose hardware processor configured using software, the general purpose hardware processor may be configured as one or more modules that may change over time. For example, software may thus configure a hardware processor to constitute a particular module at one instance in time and to constitute a different module at a different instance in time.

Machine (e.g., computer system) 8000 may include a hardware processor 8002 (e.g., a Central Processing Unit (CPU), a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU), a hardware processor core, or any combination thereof), a main memory 8004, and a static memory 8006, some or all of which may communicate with each other via a bus 8008. The machine 8000 may also include a display unit 8010, an alphanumeric input device 8012 (e.g., a keyboard), a User Interface (UI) control device 8014, and/or other input devices. In an example, the display unit 8010 and the UI control device 8014 may be a touch screen display. The machine 8000 may additionally include a storage device (e.g., drive unit) 8016, a signal generation device 8018 (e.g., a speaker), and a network interface device 8020.

The storage device 8016 may include a machine-readable medium 8022 on which is stored one or more sets of data structures or instructions 8024 (e.g., software) that implement or are utilized by any one or more of the techniques or functions described herein. Instructions 8024 may also reside (completely or at least partially) within main memory 8004, within static memory 8006, or within hardware processor 8002 during execution thereof by machine 8000. In an example, one or any combination of hardware processor 8002, main memory 8004, static memory 8006, or storage device 8016 may constitute a machine-readable medium.

While the machine-readable medium 8022 is illustrated as a single medium, the term "machine-readable medium" can include a single medium or multiple media (e.g., a centralized or distributed database, and/or associated caches and servers) configured to store the one or more instructions 8024.

The term "machine-readable medium" may include any tangible medium that is capable of storing, encoding, or carrying instructions for execution by the machine 8000, and that causes the machine 8000 to perform any one or more of the techniques of this disclosure, or that is capable of storing, encoding or carrying data structures used by or associated with such instructions. Non-limiting examples of machine-readable media may include solid-state memory and optical and magnetic media. Specific examples of the machine-readable medium may include: non-volatile memories such as semiconductor memory devices (e.g., electrically programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM)) and flash memory devices; magnetic disks such as internal hard disks and removable disks; magnet-optical disc; and CD-ROM and DVD-ROM disks.

The instructions 8024 may also be transmitted or received over a communication network 8026 using a transmission medium via the network interface device 8020. Network interface device 8020 may connect machine 8000 to a network of other machines by utilizing any one of a number of transmission protocols (e.g., frame relay, Internet Protocol (IP), Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), User Datagram Protocol (UDP), hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP), etc.) to communicate with the other machines in the network. Example communication networks may include a Local Area Network (LAN), a Wide Area Network (WAN), a packet data network (e.g., the Internet), a mobile telephone network (e.g., a cellular network), a Plain Old Telephone (POTS) network, and a wireless data network (e.g., the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 family of standards known as Wi-Fi @, the IEEE 802.16 family of standards known as WiMax @), a peer-to-peer (P2P) network, among others). In an example, the network interface device 8020 may include one or more physical jacks (e.g., ethernet, coaxial, or telephone jacks) or one or more antennas to connect to the communication network 8026. In an example, and as shown in fig. 8, the network interface device 8020 may contain multiple antennas (not shown) to wirelessly communicate using at least one of single-input multiple-output (SIMO), multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), or multiple-input single-output (MISO) techniques. The term "transmission medium" shall be taken to include any intangible medium that is capable of storing, encoding or carrying instructions for execution by the machine 8000, and that includes digital or analog communications signals or other intangible medium to facilitate communication of such software.

Other notes and examples

Example 1: disclosed is a User Equipment (UE), comprising: a response module arranged to receive one or more downlink assignments for a bundling window on a wireless downlink control channel; setting a reception status of each subframe of the downlink data channel in the bundling window based on whether a subframe on the downlink data channel is associated with a particular one of the downlink assignments and based on whether the subframe is successfully received, and setting a reception status of a subframe that does not have a downlink data channel in the bundling window for the corresponding downlink assignment to a predetermined value; and a transmitting module arranged to transmit a response, the response being based on the reception status set by the responding module.

Example 2: the UE of example 1, wherein the reception status is one of Acknowledgement (ACK), Negative Acknowledgement (NACK), and discontinuous reception (DTX).

Example 3: the UE of any of examples 1-2, wherein the predetermined value is a value indicating Discontinuous Transmission (DTX).

Example 4: the UE of any of examples 1-3, wherein the UE is arranged to operate in a Time Division Duplex (TDD) mode and wherein the transmitting module is arranged to transmit the response using a Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH) format 1 b.

Example 5: the UE of any of examples 1-4, wherein the bundling window is greater than 2 subframes.

Example 6: the UE of any one of examples 1-5, wherein the transmitting module is arranged to transmit the response by selecting a PUCCH uplink resource, a constellation, and a set of code input bits based on the reception state.

Example 7: the UE of any of examples 1-6, wherein the UE is arranged to communicate with the wireless network using a Long Term Evolution (LTE) family of standards.

Example 8: the UE of any of examples 1-7, wherein the UE is arranged to utilize carrier aggregation with two serving cell configurations.

Example 9: disclosed is a method comprising determining, for each index j for a plurality of downlink subframes, whether one or more received Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) values are equal to j + p, the one or more DAI values being received on a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH), wherein j ≦ M-1, M being the number of subframes in a HARQ bundling window, wherein p is a constant; in response to determining that none of the one or more DAI values is equal to j +1, setting a reception status of a subframe corresponding to j to a predetermined value; and transmitting a reception status of each of the plurality of downlink subframes j in the bundling window M.

Example 10: the method of example 9, wherein the predetermined value is a value indicating Discontinuous Transmission (DTX).

Example 11: the method of any of examples 9-10, comprising: determining whether there is a Primary Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) transmission on a primary cell that does not have a corresponding PDCCH detected within a bundling window; in response to determining that there is a PDSCH without a corresponding PDCCH, setting p to 0; in response to determining that there is no PDSCH with no corresponding PDCCH, p is set to 1.

Example 12: the method of any of examples 9-11, wherein the reception status is transmitted using a Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH) format 1 b.

Example 13: the method of any of examples 9-12, comprising: the reception state is transmitted by selecting at least a PUCCH uplink resource, a constellation, and a set of code input bits based on the reception state.

Example 14: disclosed is a User Equipment (UE), comprising: a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) module arranged to: for each index j for multiple downlink subframes: determining whether one or more received Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) values are equal to j + p, where p is a constant, the one or more DAI values are received on a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH), where j ≦ M-1, and where M is a number of subframes in a HARQ bundling window, determining a reception status of a subframe corresponding to j in response to determining that one of the one or more DAI values is equal to j + p, and setting the reception status of the subframe corresponding to j to a predetermined value in response to determining that none of the one or more DAI values is equal to j + p; and a transmitting module arranged to transmit a reception status of each of the plurality of downlink subframes j in the bundling window M.

Example 15: the UE of example 14, wherein the reception status is one of Acknowledgement (ACK), Negative Acknowledgement (NACK), and discontinuous reception (DTX).

Example 16: the UE of any of examples 14-15, wherein the predetermined value is a value indicating Discontinuous Transmission (DTX).

Example 17: the UE of any one of examples 14-16, wherein a value of the predetermined value is different from a value indicating ACK, NACK, and DTX.

Example 18: the UE of any one of examples 14-17, wherein the predetermined value is a value randomly selected from one of values indicating ACK, NACK, and DTX.

Example 19: the UE of any one of examples 14-18, wherein the UE is arranged to operate in a Time Division Duplex (TDD) mode.

Example 20: the UE of any one of examples 14-19, wherein the UE is arranged to multiplex HARQ reception states.

Example 21: the UE of any one of examples 14-20, wherein the transmitting module is arranged to transmit the reception status using a Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH) format 1 b.

Example 22: the UE of any one of examples 14-21, wherein the HARQ module is further arranged to: determining whether there is a Primary Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) transmission on a primary cell that does not have a corresponding PDCCH detected within a bundling window; in response to determining that there is a PDSCH without a corresponding PDCCH, setting p to 0; in response to determining that there is no PDSCH with no corresponding PDCCH, p is set to 1.

Example 23: the UE of any one of examples 14-22, wherein the transmitting module is arranged to transmit the reception status by selecting a PUCCH uplink resource, a constellation, and a set of code input bits based on the reception status.

Example 24: the UE of any one of examples 14-23, wherein the UE is arranged to communicate with the wireless network using a Long Term Evolution (LTE) family of standards.

Claims (20)

1. A User Equipment (UE), comprising:

hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) circuitry configured to:

determining that a Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) is not equal to j + p, where p is a constant and j is an index of a downlink subframe; and

a transmit circuit configured to:

transmitting a HARQ reception state of discontinuous reception in response to the determination.

2. The UE of claim 1 further comprising receiver circuitry, and wherein the receiver circuitry is arranged to receive the DAI in the downlink subframe.

3. The UE of claim 2, wherein the receiver circuitry is further configured to:

receiving the DAI through a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH).

4. The UE of claim 3, wherein the receiver circuitry is further configured to:

receiving the DAI in a downlink semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release message over the PDCCH.

5. The UE of claim 4, wherein the transmit circuitry is configured to transmit the HARQ receive status in response to receiving the SPS release message.

6. A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed on a device, cause the device to:

determining that a Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) is not equal to j + p, where p is a constant and j is an index of a downlink subframe; and

transmitting circuitry arranged to transmit a HARQ reception state of discontinuous reception in response to the determination.

7. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 6, comprising instructions to further cause the apparatus to receive the DAI in the downlink subframe.

8. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 7, comprising instructions to further cause the apparatus to receive the DAI over a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH).

9. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8, comprising instructions to further cause the machine to receive the DAI in a downlink semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release message over the PDCCH.

10. A non-transitory computer-readable medium as defined in claim 9, comprising instructions to further cause the machine to transmit the HARQ receipt status in response to receiving the SPS release message.

11. An evolved node b (enodeb), comprising:

a transmitting module arranged to transmit a downlink subframe with an index value j; and

a receiving module arranged to receive a HARQ reception state of discontinuous reception (DTX) in response to transmitting a downlink subframe having a value of a Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) unequal to j + p, where p is a constant.

12. The eNodeB of claim 11, wherein the transmitting module transmits the DAI over a PDCCH.

13. The eNodeB of claim 12, wherein the transmitting module transmits the DAI in a downlink semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release message over the PDCCH.

14. The eNodeB of claim 11, wherein the eNodeB is arranged to operate in a Time Division Duplex (TDD) mode.

15. The eNodeB of claim 11, wherein the receiving module is arranged to receive a multiplexed HARQ reception status for a plurality of downlink subframes, the plurality of downlink subframes comprising a bundling window of M downlink subframes.

16. A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed on a device, cause the device to:

transmitting a downlink subframe having an index value j; and

receiving a HARQ reception state of discontinuous reception (DTX) in response to transmitting a downlink subframe having a value of a Downlink Assignment Index (DAI) unequal to j + p, where p is a constant.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16, comprising instructions that cause the device to:

transmitting the DAI through a PDCCH.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, comprising instructions that cause the device to:

transmitting the DAI in a downlink semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) release message over the PDCCH.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16, wherein the apparatus is arranged to operate in a Time Division Duplex (TDD) mode.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16, wherein the instructions further cause the device to:

receiving a multiplexed HARQ receive state for a plurality of downlink subframes including a bundled window of M downlink subframes.