Qualcomm Incorporated

Sidney Brower Schrum, Jr

Lawrence W Yonge, Iii

Matthew Brendan Shoemake

Richard E Newman

Srinivas Katar

Gregory Lee Christison

Etan Gur Cohen

Brian R Doherty

Fred S Stivers

John M Hughes

Sridhar Rajagopal

Manjunath Anandarama Krishnam

Felix Carlos Fernandes

Tom Miller

Syed Nadeem Ahmed

Brian Joseph

Roshan Rajendra Baliga

Michael B Ryan

Yaming Zhang

Anoop Krishnan Nair

John C Sarallo

Described herein is datagram segmentation and acknowledgment in a network. A communication node in the network may determine a length of a datagram is greater than a maximum protocol data unit (PDU) length of a protocol of the network and create a segmented message comprising the datagram and a payload length field indicating the length of the datagram. The node may then segment the segmented message into segments and create a PDU comprising one or more of the segments and a segment number least significant bits (LSB) field comprising least significant bits of a segment number associated with the one or more segments. The PDUs may be acknowledged using selective acknowledgment (SACK) messages. The SACK message may comprise a SACK type indicator, a segment number most significant bits (SN_MSB) indicator, and a payload comprising one or more least significant bits (LSBs) of a segment of the segmented message.

Efficient datagram segmentation and reassembly for packet-switched networks

A slotted message access protocol can be implemented for transmitting short packets. Each beacon period may be divided into multiple time slots. At least one time slot may be assigned to a network device per beacon period based, at least in part, on latency specifications of packets that the network device is configured to transmit. In one example, some of the unassigned time slots may be designated as contention-based time slots. Network devices may contend with each other to gain control of and transmit packets during a contention-based time slot based on the priority level of the packets to be transmitted. Network devices may also use an encryption key and an initialization vector for securely exchanging short packets. Furthermore, a repeater network device may be designated to retransmit a packet, received from an original transmitting network device, during a communication time slot assigned to the original transmitting network device.

Slotted message access protocol for powerline communication networks

A hybrid device can apply forwarding tables associated with one or more other hybrid network devices of a hybrid communication network to control the entire transmission route of a frame scheduled for transmission. The hybrid device can use its forwarding table and a forwarding table of a destination hybrid device to determine a source network interface address, a destination network interface address, and a frame transmission route. The destination hybrid device can use forwarding tables associated with one or more hybrid network devices to determine whether to process or drop a received frame, whether the frame was previously received, and/or whether the frame was received on an incorrect network interface. The hybrid device can also use the forwarding tables to ensure that the frame comprises an appropriate link layer address and to select an appropriate transmission route based on analyzing link performance values associated with multiple transmission routes.

Forwarding tables for hybrid communication networks

A hybrid network device can implement an address management scheme for maintaining consistency between source/destination addresses and corresponding source/destination communication interfaces. In one embodiment, a first network device can select a first network path from a plurality of network paths associated with the communication network for transmitting a packet to a second network device. A source address can be determined from a plurality of addresses associated with a plurality of communication interfaces of the first network device. A destination address can be determined from a plurality of addresses associated with a plurality of communication interfaces of the second network device based, in part, on the selected first network path. The packet including at least the source address and the destination address can be transmitted via the first network path from a source communication interface of the first network device to a destination communication interface of the second network device.

Addressing scheme for hybrid communication networks

A hybrid bridge can implement functionality for selectively populating its bridge tables based on preferred transmission routes to influence other network devices to transmit frames based on the preferred transmission routes. The hybrid bridge determines a preferred transmission route for communicating with each network device in the hybrid communication network. For each of the network devices, it is determined whether the hybrid bridge is part of the preferred transmission route associated with the network device. Depending on whether the hybrid bridge is part of the preferred transmission route to the network device and/or whether a network interface of the hybrid bridge is a transmit or a receive interface on the preferred transmission route, a local bridge table or a remote bridge table of the network interface can be populated with at least the address of a destination network device.

Bridging network devices in a hybrid communication network

A hybrid device can execute hybrid ARP functionality to manage one-to-many associations between a single network layer address and multiple link layer addresses of other hybrid devices. In accordance with the hybrid ARP functionality, the hybrid device can determine a transmission route, a corresponding one of a plurality of network interfaces of a destination hybrid device, and a corresponding one of a plurality of link layer addresses of the destination hybrid device, based on address resolution store entries associated with the destination hybrid device. The identified link layer address can be populated in a frame for transmission to the destination hybrid device. Additionally, the hybrid ARP functionality can be configured to operate in conjunction with conventional ARP functionality implemented by upper protocol layers. The hybrid ARP functionality can serve as a 'proxy' between the conventional ARP functionality and one or more hybrid devices of the hybrid communication network.

Address resolution mechanism for hybrid communication networks

A hybrid device can be configured to use WLAN communication links for bridging network traffic between any pair of network devices in a hybrid communication network, irrespective of whether the bridged network devices support WLAN communication. The hybrid device receives a first data frame in a first frame format for transmission to a destination device. The hybrid device accesses its hybrid forwarding tables and identifies a transmit interface from which to transmit the first data frame for transmission to the destination device. If the transmit interface is a WLAN interface, WLAN forwarding tables associated with the WLAN transmit interface are accessed to identify a receiving WLAN device to which the first data frame should be transmitted. The WLAN transmit interface converts the first data frame into a second data frame in a WLAN frame format and transmits the second data frame to the receiving WLAN device.

Wireless bridging in a hybrid communication network

A hybrid network device can implement functionality for automatically detecting and locating legacy bridges in a communication network. In one embodiment, a first network device of a first class of network devices can determine that a second network device of a second class of network devices is communicatively located adjacent to at least one of a plurality of network interfaces of the first network device based, in part, on detecting that a packet originating from the second network device does not include a predetermined tag. The first network device can determine whether network segments associated with the first network device and a target network device are communicatively coupled via a network bridge device of the second class of network devices based on transmitting probe messages to the second network device and determining whether the target network device detected the probe messages.

Discovery of conventional devices and bridges in hybrid communication networks

A hybrid network device can implement functionality to indicate the sequence of packets associated with a common packet stream transmitted via a plurality of packet routes and to manage out-of-order packet arrival. In a hybrid communication network, a first network device can determine sequence identifiers associated with a plurality of packets of a packet stream received from a second network device via a plurality of packet routes between the first network device and the second network device. The first network device can detect out-of-order delivery of one or more of the plurality of received packets based, at least in part, on the sequence identifiers associated with the plurality of packets. Consequently, the first network device can re-order at least a subset of the plurality of packets based on the sequence identifiers associated with the plurality of packets.

Multiple delivery route packet ordering

The convenience of a wireless network is tempered by the concern that a rogue device can listen in on the wireless communications. Determining the position of the home device and other devices within range allows the user of the home device to choose the specific wireless devices with which to communicate. The distance to the other devices within wireless communications range is helpful and allows the user to sort between safe and unsafe or rogue devices. Distance can be determined by a variety of methods including use of trusted references, signal strength, and error rate. Once the safe device is selected, the system will then establish a communications path with that device.

Position based enhanced security of wireless communications

A hybrid network device can implement functionality for automatic path selection and modification in a hybrid communication network. The hybrid network device can select an initial network interface from a plurality of network interfaces for transmitting a packet stream. In response to determining that the medium utilization of the initial network interface exceeds the medium utilization threshold, the hybrid network device can identify one or more packet streams originating from the initial network interface to shift to corresponding one or more alternate network interfaces. The hybrid network device can attempt to reduce the medium utilization of the initial network interface below the medium utilization threshold while maintaining the medium utilization of the one or more alternate network interfaces below the corresponding medium utilization thresholds. The hybrid network device can shift the one or more packet streams from the initial network interface to the corresponding one or more alternate network interfaces.

Automatic path selection for hybrid communication networks

A method is provided for managing transmissions among nodes communicating over a shared communication medium. The method includes: transmitting a frame from a sender node to a plurality of receiver nodes, the frame including at least a portion of a data packet and control information associated with accessing the communication medium; transmitting over the communication medium information indicating an end of a time window allocated for transmission of acknowledgement signals to the sender node from at least some of the plurality of receiver nodes; assigning each of a plurality of time slots in the time window to different subsets of the plurality of receiver nodes; and for a given receiver node, transmitting an acknowledgement signal from the given receiver node to the sender node during a time slot assigned to the given receiver node, the acknowledgement signal responsive to at least the frame.

Managing transmissions among nodes communicating over a shared communication medium

The present invention provides a method and apparatus for optimizing the transmission of video configuration data in a system comprising a host computer and a display monitor. The invention comprises a wireless video source adapter connected to the host computer and a wireless video sink adapter connected to the monitor. Upon system startup, the video sink adapter acquires EDID information from the monitor and transmits it to the video source adapter, which does not activate its connection and indicate its presence to the host computer until after receiving the EDID information. The video source adapter then supplies the EDID information to the host computer in response to EDID requests from the computer. In this manner, the video source adapter acts as a virtual proxy for the display monitor from the point of the view of the host computer. The host computer then uses the EDID information to configure its video signal to match the parameters of the display monitor.

Wireless monitor proxy

A system, method and computer-readable medium for reducing the required throughput in an ultra-wideband system is provided. A temporal sub-sampling routine limits the number of frames, or portions thereof, to be transmitted to a sink over an RF link. The temporal sub-sampling routine may have a fixed, or static, sub-sampling rate that specifies the rate at which frames are discarded. In accordance with another embodiment, an automatic temporal sub-sampling mechanism is provided. Additionally, a tile copying mechanism may be implemented for reducing the throughput of the RF link. A WDV subsystem may include an interface to an external frame buffer that facilitates the temporal sub-sampling and tile copy routines disclosed herein.

Growing community of inventors

Ocala, FL, United States of America

Sidney Brower Schrum, Jr