Lucent Technologies Inc.

Mark Kevin Stockert

Jeffrey Ross Light

Charles Varvaro

Chung-Zin Liu

Randall Joe Wilson

Kenneth Wayne Strom

Omar Salvador

Stephen Clifford Goss

Gitesh P Shah

Brian David Bolliger

Apparatus and a method for establishing a cellular mobile call. If no radio traffic (voice or data) channels are available for a calling Mobile Station (MS), then a test is made to determine the expected wait time before a channel becomes available. If the expected wait time is less than a first threshold, then the call request is queued. If a channel does not become available before a second time threshold, then the caller is notified that the call has been queued and is expected to be established in a short time. A control message is sent to the MS to trigger an indication of the queued status to the user. The indication may be one or more tones, a data display, or the playing of a pre-recorded announcement. If the expected wait time is more than the first threshold, the caller is given the opportunity to be called back when a radio channel becomes available. Advantageously, the number of failed calls because of unavailable traffic channels is reduced, and the caller's annoyance level is reduced.

Queuing for radio channel availability

Apparatus and a method for establishing a cellular mobile call. If no radio traffic (voice or data) channels are available for a calling or called mobile station (MS), then a test is made to determine the expected wait time before a channel becomes available. If the expected wait time is less than a first threshold, then the call or the call request is queued. If a channel for an incoming call to an MS does not become available before a second time threshold, then the caller is notified by an announcement that the call has been queued and is expected to be established in a short time. If the caller of an incoming call to the MS does not disconnect, then the MSC waits for an available channel and establishes a connection to the MS over that available channel. For an outgoing call from an MS, a control message is sent to the MS to trigger an indication of the queued status to the user. The indication may be one or more tones, a data display, or the playing of a pre-recorded announcement. Advantageously, the number of calls blocked because of unavailable traffic channels is reduced. Advantageously, the same arrangement can be used to reduce blocking of calls because of unavailability of trunks for a link of a call connection.

Enhanced wireless radio channel utilization

A method and apparatus for determining whether a wireless station is operating within a prescribed geographic location. During an initialization process, the wireless telephone measures propagation delays of pilot signals from nearby base stations and stores the propagation delays in a non-volatile memory of the wireless station. Thereafter, during a check process, the wireless station measures propagation delays of pilot signals from nearby base stations and compares them with the stored propagation delays stored in memory. If the difference between the two sets of propagation delays are within a predetermined tolerance, then a determination is made that the wireless station is operating within the prescribed geographic location. Multiple sets of propagation delays may be stored in memory such that a determination can be made as to whether the mobile station is operating within any one of a number of prescribed geographic locations.

Method and apparatus for determining whether a wireless station is

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Singapore, Singapore

Mark Kevin Stockert