The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Nov. 24, 2009
Filed:
Dec. 05, 2005
Sophie Vrzic, Nepean, CA;
Kelvin AU, Ottawa, CA;
Hongyi LI, Ottawa, CA;
Tricci SO, Kanata, CA;
Nortel Networks Limited, St. Laurent, Quebec, CA;
Abstract
The invention provides various schemes for negotiating communications between wireless mesh network nodes operating in accordance with the IEEE 802.11e standard. However, more generally, the invention can be operated in accordance with other communication standards. According to a broad embodiment of the invention, a method is provided in which meeting durations are divided into at least two portions, an uplink transmission portion and a downlink transmission portion. In order to protect the negotiation packets from collisions, the negotiation process is combined with the uplink and downlink data transmissions. In some aspects of the invention, the negotiation process is protected from collisions by using the transmission opportunity (TXOP) protocol that is available in the IEEE 802.11e standard. The inventive methods can be used with a contention based protocol or a contention free based protocol. According to another broad embodiment of the invention there is provided a wireless network node capable of implementing methods described for negotiating communications between neighbouring nodes.