WO2017133282A1 - Method and apparatus for supporting data transmission of machine type communication devices - Google Patents

Abstract

A method and apparatus for supporting data transmission of machine type communication (MTC) devices, comprising: determining that data transmission mode switch is required; and instructing, by an uplink message, a network side device to perform data transmission mode switch. Flexible data transmission mode switch for different services of MTC having different QoS and network performance requirements can be achieved.

Description

Method and device for supporting data transmission of machine type communication equipment Technical field

This document relates to, but is not limited to, the field of communications, and in particular to a method and apparatus for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device.

Background technique

With the rapid development of wireless communication technology and the increasing demand for communication, the 5G era is coming. An important application of 5G is Machine Type Communication (MTC). MTC has a large potential application prospect, which has won the attention of a large number of mobile network operators, equipment manufacturers and research institutions. MTC's main application areas include smart grid, intelligent transportation, smart home, remote measurement, wireless sensor network, etc., which are important components of the emerging Internet of Things.

The services supported by MTC devices are diverse. The requirements for most MTC devices are usually low cost and low power consumption, such as a large number of sensors for environmental monitoring or agriculture. The services supported by MTC devices are generally low-rate, but there may be situations where big data needs to be transmitted. Services supported by MTC devices generally have low latency requirements, but there may be situations where emergency events require fast transmission.

For example, for fire alarm equipment, its business has the following requirements:

The keepalive information is periodically reported, and the keep-alive information is used by the server to determine whether and when the device fails, the delay requirement is not high, and the data volume is as small as several tens of bytes (BYTE) or lower;

The fire alarm reports the information, the delay requirement is relatively high, the data volume may be as small as several tens of bytes, and the video information may need to be reported, and the amount of data is relatively large to several megabytes (M);

Server command, the delay requirement is relatively high, and the amount of data is as small as several tens of BYTE or lower;

The software version is updated, the delay requirement is relatively low, the amount of data is relatively large, and there may be several M.

It can be seen that the MTC device supports a variety of services, including periodic service reporting, abnormal event reporting, network command delivery, and software version update. The quality of service (QoS) required by different services for different networks is also different.

At the same time, some MTC devices may transmit high-speed data, such as in portable applications, smart glasses may need to transmit real-time video data. Smart watches may require a phone call, and this business requires a high Qos guarantee.

The number of MTC devices may be massive, and a large number of device accesses may bring a large amount of signaling overhead to the network. In order to effectively reduce the cost of MTC equipment and to save system overhead on the network side, the 3GPP standard currently introduces two small data transmission methods for optimization:

1. Control plane optimization mode: The data packet is packaged into a network attached storage packet data unit (NAS PDU) attached to the control plane signaling for transmission.

2, user plane optimization mode: the terminal and the network side use the Data Resource Bearer (DRB) between the terminal and the base station to transmit data. After the data transmission is completed, both parties save the bearer information context, and the application server (Application Server, AS) security context When the data is sent again, the two parties resume the use of the DRB bearer by suspending the activation process.

However, the control plane optimization method has the following disadvantages:

1. The security performance is slightly worse: no DRB is established in the control plane optimization scheme. The network side and the terminal have no AS security context, and the data cannot be AS layer encrypted.

2. It is not suitable for transmitting relatively large data volume: Considering that the NAS PDU attached to the signaling is very limited, the length of the transmitted data packet is limited. For a relatively large data packet, it needs to be divided into too many small packets, considering that the MTC device generally does not cover. Too good, it is easy to bring about packet loss, which makes it difficult for the receiver to receive the complete packet. Moreover, the control plane mode uses signaling to transmit data. Too many small packets will bring too much signaling transmission and occupy too much resources.

3. Low-priority data service occupies too high scheduling resources: Generally, the periodic reporting data sent by the MTC terminal has a lower priority, but because the data is attached to the air interface layer 3 signaling, the obtained data is obtained. Scheduling priority processing similar to conventional Radio Resource Control (RRC) signaling, which will crowd out the scheduling priorities of those real RRC access signaling (without MTC data transmission), which may result in higher air interface access. failure.

In addition, when the data is supported in the network and the control plane is optimized to transmit and use the DRB transmission, the signal bearer (SRB) is adjusted between the terminal and the base station. The priority is always higher than the DRB. Therefore, these low-priority data can always obtain higher scheduling priority than the DRB, which may result in high priority service scheduling using DRB transmission.

The user plane optimization scheme has the following disadvantages:

1. The signaling optimization effect has no control plane optimization effect: the control plane optimization mode saves more signaling; and the user plane optimization scheme needs to restore the bearer context information first, and then transmit the data. Relatively speaking, the signaling optimization effect is smaller.

2, bearer context maintenance overhead is relatively large, there is a risk of misalignment: the terminal and the network side always maintain the terminal MTC service bearer context, there is a certain system overhead, including memory overhead, Central Processing Unit (CPU) Overhead. In addition, context misalignment may occur during prolonged use. Because MTC devices are generally used for a long time, for years or even ten years, and the network side is constantly changing, it is likely to pose a risk of inconsistency with the terminal context. Changes in device access to the cell introduce additional overhead for context migration. Because the assignment of the service bearer context is related to the site, when the site or cell accessed by the device changes, the network side needs to transfer or modify the context between the sites.

The Third Generation Partnership Projects (3GPP) network currently provides a method for the MTC terminal to negotiate a data transmission mode with the network side through an Attach process, which cannot meet the various MTC service transmission scenarios in the device. Different Qos requirements; may have a negative impact on the network, such as excessive network side overhead.

Summary of the invention

The following is an overview of the topics detailed in this document. This Summary is not intended to limit the scope of the claims.

Embodiments of the present invention provide a method and apparatus for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device, and satisfy flexible data transmission of QoS and network performance of different services of the MTC.

The technical solution adopted by the embodiment of the present invention is as follows:

A method for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device, which is applied to an MTC terminal, including:

Determining that the data transmission mode needs to be switched;

The network side device is notified by the uplink message to perform data transmission mode switching.

Optionally, determining that the data transmission mode needs to be switched includes:

The data transmission mode needs to be switched according to the state information of the current communication service of the machine type communication MTC and the processing capability of the MTC terminal.

Optionally, after the uplink information is used to notify the network side device to perform the data transmission mode switching, the method further includes:

Receiving handover response information sent by the network side device;

Clearing the context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service;

The context information of the data transmission mode is updated according to the switched data transmission mode.

Optionally, the status information of the current transmission service includes at least one of the following:

Business data volume, business service quality Qos requirements, terminal capabilities, terminal load, terminal power.

Optionally, the uplink message includes at least one of the following:

Uplink network attached storage NAS message or uplink air interface RRC message;

The uplink network attached storage NAS message or the uplink air interface RRC message includes a handover indication.

Optionally, the handover indication includes: switching a data transmission mode indication cell or a data transmission destination mode cell.

The embodiment of the invention further provides a method for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device, which is applied to a network side device, and includes:

Receiving an uplink message sent by the MTC terminal;

And performing data transmission mode switching according to the switching instruction of the uplink message.

Optionally, performing data transmission mode switching according to the switching indication of the uplink message includes:

Clearing the context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service;

Updating context information of the data transmission mode according to the handover indication of the uplink message.

Optionally, after updating the context information of the data transmission mode according to the handover indication of the uplink message, the method further includes: sending handover response information to the MTC terminal.

Optionally, the network side device comprises a base station and/or a mobility management entity MME.

The embodiment of the present invention further provides an apparatus for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device, which is disposed on the MTC terminal, and includes:

The first switching module is configured to determine that the data transmission mode needs to be switched;

The first communication module is configured to notify the network side device to perform data transmission mode switching by using an uplink message.

Optionally, the determining, by the first switching module, that the data transmission mode needs to be switched includes:

The data transmission mode needs to be switched according to the state information of the current communication service of the machine type communication MTC and the processing capability of the MTC terminal.

Optionally, the first communications module is further configured to receive the handover response information sent by the network side device;

The first switching module is further configured to clear context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; and update context information of the data transmission mode according to the switched data transmission mode.

The embodiment of the invention further provides an apparatus for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device, which is disposed on the network side device, and includes:

a second communication module, configured to receive an uplink message sent by the MTC terminal;

The second switching module is configured to perform data transmission mode switching according to the switching instruction of the uplink message.

Optionally, the second switching module is further configured to: clear context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; and update context information of the data transmission mode according to the switching indication of the uplink message.

Optionally, the second communication module is further configured to send handover response information to the MTC terminal.

The embodiments of the present invention have the following beneficial effects:

The solution provided by the embodiment of the present invention provides a flexible data transmission mode switching method that satisfies the QoS and network performance of different services of the MTC, and implements flexible switching between the control plane data transmission mode and the user plane data transmission mode, and can select different data for different MTC services. Send mode, able to meet Different QoS requirements of various MTC service transmission scenarios in the device improve the Qos guarantee of the MTC service, including the requirements of the service for the delay, the security requirements of the service, and the requirements of the service rate.

Other aspects will be apparent upon reading and understanding the drawings and detailed description.

BRIEF abstract

1 is a flow chart of a method for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device according to an embodiment of the present invention;

2 is a flow chart of another method for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device according to an embodiment of the present invention;

3 is a schematic structural diagram of an apparatus for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device according to an embodiment of the present invention;

4 is a schematic structural diagram of another apparatus for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device according to an embodiment of the present invention;

5 is a schematic diagram of a terminal indicating a network side data transmission mode switching by using an uplink NAS message;

FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of the terminal side indicating a network side data transmission mode switching by using an uplink air interface message.

Embodiments of the invention

The embodiments of the present invention are described below with reference to the accompanying drawings. It should be noted that the features in the embodiments and the embodiments in the present application may be arbitrarily combined with each other without conflict.

As shown in FIG. 1 , an embodiment of the present invention provides a method for supporting data transmission of a device-type communication device, which is applied to an MTC terminal, and includes:

Determining that the data transmission mode needs to be switched;

The network side device is notified by the uplink message to perform data transmission mode switching.

Determining the data transfer mode that needs to be switched includes:

According to the machine type communication MTC current transmission service status information and the MTC terminal processing industry The ability to determine the data transfer mode requires a switch.

The method further includes:

Receiving, by using an uplink message, the network side device to perform the data transmission mode switching, and receiving the handover response information sent by the network side device;

Clearing the context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service;

The context information of the data transmission mode is updated according to the switched data transmission mode.

The status information of the current transmission service in the embodiment of the present invention includes at least one of the following:

Business data volume, business service quality Qos requirements, terminal capabilities, terminal load, terminal power, etc. In other embodiments, it is not limited to the above state information, and may be other state information.

The uplink message includes at least one of the following:

Uplink network attached storage NAS message or uplink air interface RRC message;

The uplink network attached storage NAS message or the uplink air interface RRC message includes a handover indication.

The handover indication may be a field added by the uplink NAS message or the uplink air interface RRC message, or may be an existing field of the uplink NAS message or the uplink air interface RRC message.

The MTC UE instructs the network side device to switch between different data transmission modes according to the data volume size, the service QoS feature, and the terminal capability of the MTC service, including:

The terminal determines whether the current data transmission mode needs to be switched by using the traffic volume and the service QoS feature. If the handover is required, the network side device is notified by the uplink message to perform the data transmission mode switching.

Upstream NAS messages include but are not limited to the following messages:

INITIAL CONTEXT SETUP RESPONSE;

INITIAL CONTEXT SETUP FAILURE;

UE CONTEXT RELEASE REQUEST;

UE CONTEXT MODIFICATION RESPONSE;

UE CONTEXT MODIFICATION FAILURE;

INITIAL UE MESSAGE;

UPLINK NAS TRANSPORT;

NAS NON DELIVERY INDICATION;

Add an upstream NAS message.

The uplink RRC message includes but is not limited to the following messages:

RRCConnectionReconfigurationComplete;

RRCConnectionReestablishmentComplete;

RRCConnectionReestablishmentRequest;

RRCConnectionRequest;

RRCConnectionSetupComplete;

ULInformationTransfer;

UEInformationResponse;

Add an upstream air interface message.

The handover indication includes: switching a data transmission mode indication cell or a data transmission destination mode cell.

The method for indicating the switching data transmission mode is as follows but is not limited to the following:

Adding a handover indication by using an uplink NAS message or adding a handover indication by using an uplink air interface message; the newly added handover indication may be a new UE handover data transmission mode indication cell, or adding a data transmission mode cell that is desired to be switched, or It is the reason indication of the switch.

As shown in FIG. 2, an embodiment of the present invention provides a method for supporting data transmission of a device-type communication device, which is applied to a network side device, and includes:

Receiving an uplink message sent by the MTC terminal;

And performing data transmission mode switching according to the switching instruction of the uplink message.

Performing a data transmission mode switching according to the switching indication of the uplink message includes:

Clearing the context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service;

Updating context information of the data transmission mode according to the handover indication of the uplink message.

The method further includes: after updating the context information of the data transmission mode according to the handover indication of the uplink message, sending handover response information to the MTC terminal.

The network side device comprises a base station or/and a mobility management entity MME.

As shown in FIG. 3, an embodiment of the present invention provides an apparatus for supporting data transmission of a device-type communication device, which is disposed on an MTC terminal, and includes:

The first switching module 301 is configured to determine that the data transmission mode needs to be switched;

The first communication module 302 is configured to notify the network side device to perform data transmission mode switching by using an uplink message.

The first switching module 301 is configured to perform a handover by determining a data transmission mode by:

The data transmission mode needs to be switched according to the state information of the current communication service of the machine type communication MTC and the processing capability of the MTC terminal.

Optionally, the first communication module 302 is further configured to receive the handover response information sent by the network side device;

The first switching module 301 is further configured to: clear context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; and update context information of the data transmission mode according to the switched data transmission mode.

As shown in FIG. 4, an embodiment of the present invention provides a device for supporting data transmission of a device-type communication device, which is configured on a network side device, and includes:

The second communication module 401 is configured to receive an uplink message sent by the MTC terminal;

The second switching module 402 is configured to perform data transmission mode switching according to the switching instruction of the uplink message.

Optionally, the second switching module 402 is further configured to: clear context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; and update context information of the data transmission mode according to the switching indication of the uplink message.

Optionally, the second communication module 401 is further configured to send handover response information to the MTC terminal.

Embodiment 1

As shown in FIG. 5, the terminal uses the uplink NAS message to indicate that the network side switches from the user plane mode to the control plane mode as follows:

Step 11: The terminal currently negotiates with the network to transmit data using the user plane optimization method.

Step 12: The terminal has periodic keep-alive information to be uploaded. Considering that the data of the keep-alive information is small and the delay requirement is low, and the interval of the transmission interval is relatively long, the terminal wants to switch to the control plane mode to save signaling.

Step 13: The terminal initiates an RRC Connection Resume message to the eNodeb to resume the connection.

After receiving the eNodeb, the eNodeb is notified to the Mobility Management Entity (MME) to restore the connection of the terminal S1.

The eNodeb sends an RRC Connection Resume Complete to the terminal.

Step 14: The terminal sends a Dettach Request Dettach Request message to the MME, and a new handover indication is added to the Dettach Request message.

Step 15: After receiving the handover indication brought by the Dettach Request message, the MME clears the context information of the user plane transmission mode saved by itself, and notifies the eNodeb to clear the information by using the downlink S1 message.

The MME sends a De Attach Response Response to the terminal.

Step 16: After receiving the Dettach Response, the terminal clears the context information of the user plane transmission mode saved by the terminal.

Step 17: The terminal re-initiates the Attach Request message, which is brought into the control plane Prefer indication.

Step 18: After receiving the MME, the MME switches to the control plane optimization mode and indicates to the terminal through the Attach Response.

Among them, the terminal device supports the following four services:

1. Periodically report the keep-alive information, the delay is not required, the data volume is 0-20BYTE, and the reporting period is 10 minutes.

2, fire alarm reporting information, delay <10s, report police information, data volume 0-20BYTE;

3. The fire alarm control room issues an order to the equipment: the delay requirement is <10s, and the data volume is 0-20BYTE;

4, software version update, delay is not required, the amount of data 2000BYTE.

Embodiment 2

As shown in FIG. 6, the terminal device uses the uplink air interface message to indicate that the network side switches from the user plane mode to the control plane mode as follows:

Step 21: The terminal device currently negotiates with the network to transmit data using the user plane optimization mode.

Step 22: The terminal has periodic keep-alive information to be uploaded. Considering that the data of the keep-alive information is small and the delay requirement is low, and the interval of the transmission interval is relatively long, the terminal wants to switch to the control plane mode to save signaling.

Step 23: The terminal initiates an RRCConnectionResume message to the eNodeb to resume the connection.

After receiving the eNodeb, the MME is notified to resume the connection of the terminal S1.

The eNodeb sends an RRCConnectionResumeComplete to the UE.

Step 24: The terminal sends an uplink message to transmit the ULInformationTransfer message to the eNodeb, where a handover indication is added.

Step 25: After receiving the handover indication brought by the ULInformationTransfer message, the eNodeb clears the context information of the user plane transmission mode saved by itself, and notifies the MME to clear the information by using the UE context release request message.

After the MME clears the context information of the user plane transmission mode saved by itself, the MME sends a context release response Context Release Response message to the eNodeb.

The eNodeb sends a downlink message to transmit the DLInformationTransfer message to the UE.

Step 26: After receiving the DLInformationTransfer, the UE clears the context information of the user plane transmission mode saved by the terminal.

Step 27: The terminal re-initiates the Attach Request message, which is brought into the control plane Prefer indication.

Step 28: After receiving the MME, switch to the control plane optimization mode, and pass the Attach The Response is indicated to the UE.

One of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that all or a portion of the above steps may be performed by a program to instruct related hardware, such as a processor, which may be stored in a computer readable storage medium, such as a read only memory, disk or optical disk. Wait. Alternatively, all or part of the steps of the above embodiments may also be implemented using one or more integrated circuits. Correspondingly, each module/unit in the above embodiment may be implemented in the form of hardware, for example, by implementing an integrated circuit to implement its corresponding function, or may be implemented in the form of a software function module, for example, executing a program stored in the memory by a processor. / instruction to achieve its corresponding function. The invention is not limited to any specific form of combination of hardware and software.

The embodiments disclosed in the present invention are as described above, but the contents thereof are only for the purpose of facilitating understanding of the technical solutions of the present invention, and are not intended to limit the present invention. Any modifications and changes in the form and details of the embodiments may be made by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope of the present invention. It is subject to the scope defined by the appended claims.

Industrial applicability

The foregoing technical solution provides a flexible data transmission mode switching method that satisfies the QoS and network performance of different services of the MTC, and implements flexible switching between the control plane data transmission mode and the user plane data transmission mode, and can select different data transmission modes for different MTC services. It can meet the different QoS requirements of various MTC service transmission scenarios in the device, and improve the QoS guarantee of the MTC service, including the service delay requirement, the service security requirement, and the service rate requirement.

Claims (16)

A method for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication MTC device, which is applied to an MTC terminal, including: Determining that the data transmission mode needs to be switched; The network side device is notified by the uplink message to perform data transmission mode switching. The method of claim 1 wherein: determining that the data transfer mode requires a switch comprises: The data transmission mode needs to be switched according to the state information of the current communication service of the machine type communication MTC and the processing capability of the MTC terminal. The method of claim 1 further comprising: Receiving, by the uplink message, the network side device, after performing the data transmission mode switching, receiving the handover response information sent by the network side device; Clearing the context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; The context information of the data transmission mode is updated according to the switched data transmission mode. The method of claim 2, wherein: the status information of the current transmission service comprises at least one of the following: Business data volume, business service quality Qos requirements, terminal capabilities, terminal load, terminal power. The method of claim 1 wherein: said upstream message comprises at least one of: Uplink network attached storage NAS message or uplink air interface RRC message; The uplink network attached storage NAS message or the uplink air interface RRC message includes a handover indication. The method of claim 5, wherein the switching indication comprises: switching a data transmission mode indication cell or a data transmission destination mode cell. A method for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication MTC device, which is applied to a network side device, and includes: Receiving an uplink message sent by the MTC terminal; And performing data transmission mode switching according to the switching instruction of the uplink message. The method of claim 7, wherein the performing the data transmission mode switching according to the switching indication of the uplink message comprises: Clearing the context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; Updating context information of the data transmission mode according to the handover indication of the uplink message. The method of claim 7 further comprising: After updating the context information of the data transmission mode according to the handover indication of the uplink message, the handover response information is sent to the MTC terminal. The method of claim 7, wherein: said network side device comprises a base station and/or a mobility management entity MME. A device for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication device, which is disposed on an MTC terminal, and includes: The first switching module is configured to determine that the data transmission mode needs to be switched; The first communication module is configured to notify the network side device to perform data transmission mode switching by using an uplink message. The apparatus according to claim 11, wherein: said first switching module is configured to perform a handover by determining a data transmission mode by: The data transmission mode needs to be switched according to the state information of the current communication service of the machine type communication MTC and the processing capability of the MTC terminal. The device of claim 11 The first communication module is further configured to receive handover response information sent by the network side device; The first switching module is further configured to clear context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; and update context information of the data transmission mode according to the switched data transmission mode. A device for supporting data transmission of a machine type communication MTC device, which is disposed on a network side device, and includes: a second communication module, configured to receive an uplink message sent by the MTC terminal; The second switching module is configured to perform data transmission mode switching according to the switching instruction of the uplink message. The device of claim 14 The second switching module is further configured to: clear context information of the saved data transmission mode of the current service; and update context information of the data transmission mode according to the switching indication of the uplink message. The device of claim 14 The second communication module is further configured to send handover response information to the MTC terminal.

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