Patent application number | Description | Published |
20080279126 | MANAGING DISTRIBUTED ACCESS TO A SHARED MEDIUM - Communicating between stations in a network is described. A plurality of stations coordinate according to a distributed protocol to select a first station to transmit over a shared medium. The communication includes transmitting between the first station and a second station over the shared medium during a time period in which stations other than the first and second stations refrain from transmitting over the shared medium. The first station transmits information that grants permission to the second station to transmit during the time period. | 11-13-2008 |
20080298252 | METHOD OF ROUTING TRAFFIC IN A NETWORK - Methods, systems, and apparatuses are described for communicating among stations in a network. A station in the network can determine costs between that station and a headend through a number of other stations and selecting a low cost path from among the possible paths. Cost data from the determination can be transmitted from the station to other stations in the network for use in selecting low cost paths at those stations. | 12-04-2008 |
20080298589 | ESTABLISHING A UNIQUE END-TO-END MANAGEMENT KEY - Systems and methods for communicating and authenticating end-to-end management keys to stations to facilitate communications between stations in the network. A nonce based upon a pseudo-random number generated by the station(s) can be included with the end-to-end management key (EMK). The station(s) can compare the nonce to the generated pseudo-random number to authenticate the EMK. | 12-04-2008 |
20080298590 | NETWORK ENCRYPTION KEY ROTATION - Systems and methods for authenticating key rotation communications. Key rotation communications can include a key counter known to both a headend device and a station. Comparison between a local key counter and the key counter included in the key rotation communication can be used to authenticate the key rotation communication. | 12-04-2008 |
20080298594 | AUTHORIZING STATIONS INTO A CENTRALLY MANAGED NETWORK - Systems and methods for connecting new stations to a secure network. New stations can send connection requests to a headend device. The headend device can retrieve a device access key associated with the new station and can provide a network membership key to the new station based upon authentication of the new station using the device access key. | 12-04-2008 |
20080301052 | AUTHORIZING CUSTOMER PREMISE EQUIPMENT ON A SUB-NETWORK - Systems and methods for authorizing a customer premise equipment (CPE) device to join a network through a network termination unit (NTU). The CPE device can send an encrypted connection request, and an authorization server can decrypt the connection request and provide a network membership key (NMK) associated with the CPE device to the NTU. The authorization server can encrypt the NMK associated with the CPE device using a device access key (DAK) associated with the NTU. | 12-04-2008 |
20080301446 | AUTHORIZING CUSTOMER PREMISE EQUIPMENT INTO A NETWORK - Systems and methods for authorizing customer premise equipment into a network. A publicly available network membership key can be provided to enable initial connection to the network. Unique network membership keys associated with various customer premise equipment can be provided to enable service level access to the network and/or authorization into a sub-cell associated with the network. | 12-04-2008 |
20080310414 | RETRANSMISSION OF BROADCAST AND MULTICAST TRAFFIC OVER A SHARED MEDIUM - Methods, systems, and apparatuses are described for communicating among stations in a network. Broadcast or multicast traffic in the network can be selectively retransmitted according to one or more retransmissions rules established for the network. Retransmission rules can be established based on an analysis of network topology data and designed to minimize redundant transmissions in the network. MAC encapsulation mechanisms can be used to identify duplicate transmissions. | 12-18-2008 |
20090010276 | Contention Groups for Hidden Nodes - Communicating among stations in a network includes, from each of multiple stations in the network, transmitting information indicating which other stations from which that station is able to reliably receive transmissions. A schedule for communicating among the stations is determined based on the information from the stations and transmitting the schedule over the network. The schedule includes a plurality of time slots during which respective sets of stations are assigned to communicate using a contention-based protocol. | 01-08-2009 |
20090011782 | CLOCK SYNCHRONIZATION OVER A SHARED MEDIUM - Communicating among stations in a network includes providing repeated beacon transmissions from at least some of the stations including a first station. The first station is assigned to a first level. Any stations that can reliably receive transmissions from the first station are assigned to a second level. Any stations not assigned to any of the preceding levels that can reliably receive transmissions from the preceding level are assigned to each of one or more higher levels. Timing information at each station in a given level is synchronized according to transmissions received from at least one station in the preceding level. | 01-08-2009 |
20090034552 | IN-HOME COEXISTENCE NETWORK - Systems and methods for dynamic allocation of network bandwidth. In some examples, a guaranteed interval period, including a guaranteed interval start time and guaranteed interval end time, can be identified based upon policy. Network stations can then identify first interval start times and first interval end times different than the guaranteed start times and guaranteed end time provided by policy. An access network can thereby provide a first interval start time and a first interval end time to stations within the access network. An in-home network can determine an in-home interval period based upon the first interval start time and first interval end time. | 02-05-2009 |
20090040930 | DATA PLANE AGGREGATION BASED ON ROUTE AND SERVICE TYPE - Methods and systems are operable to aggregate data. A plurality of data units can be received. The data units can be combined based upon a class associated with the data and a next hop associated with the data. A link can be provided for the combined data units based on service quality requirements for the traffic class associated with the class. | 02-12-2009 |
20090074007 | MANAGING COMMUNICATIONS OVER A SHARED MEDIUM - Systems and methods for allocating network bandwidth between a plurality of networks. Requests for bandwidth allocation from other networks can be received. A coexistence frame requesting an allocation of bandwidth for a local network can be generated based upon the bandwidth allocation requests received from other networks. The coexistence frame can be transmitted, and utilization of the requested allocation can be delayed by a reservation period. | 03-19-2009 |
20090116461 | Distributed Scheduling - In a network, some data are transmitted between stations during time slots in contention free periods. Selecting the time slots includes collecting timing information at some stations in the network. The timing information indicates the times of existing time slots used by stations whose transmissions can be reliably received by the station collecting the timing information. The timing information is distributed to other stations in the network. A new time slot for transmission between a first and a second station is selected based at least on timing information indicating the times of existing time slots used by stations whose transmissions can be reliably received by at least one of the first and second station. | 05-07-2009 |
20090207865 | TIME SYNCHRONIZATION IN A NETWORK - A method and corresponding system for communicating between stations in a network is presented. The method includes providing repeated beacon transmissions from a coordinator station for coordinating transmissions among the stations; transmitting a signal from a first station and receiving the signal at a second station; and performing one or both of: generating the signal based on a local clock at the first station and time adjustment information in a beacon transmission received by the first station, and sampling the signal at sample times based on a local clock at the second station and time adjustment information in a beacon transmission received by the second station. | 08-20-2009 |
20090304102 | GENERATING SIGNALS FOR TRANSMISSION OF INFORMATION - A method for generating a signal is presented. The method includes selecting a first set of carrier frequencies that are integral multiples of a first frequency interval, and selecting a second set of carrier frequencies that are integral multiples of a second frequency interval. The second frequency interval is an integral multiple of the first frequency interval and the second set is a subset of the first set. The method includes, for each of one or more signal carrier frequencies in the second set, selecting a plurality of associated carrier frequencies in the first set including a peak carrier frequency having substantially the same value as the signal carrier frequency, and modulating waveform frequency components at each of the selected plurality of associated carrier frequencies according to the same data value. | 12-10-2009 |
20100074243 | MANAGING COEXISTENCE AMONG SIGNALING PROTOCOLS ON A SHARED MEDIUM - A method is described for communicating among multiple devices over a shared communication medium. The method includes, in a schedule among multiple subsets of the devices that includes at least one respective time slot for each subset, transmitting from at least one of the devices in a given subset a presence signal associated with the given subset within a time slot for the given subset. A presence signal associated with a given subset is configured to indicate the presence of at least one device in the given subset. The method also includes communicating among devices in a given subset based on presence signals detected from one or more devices in at least one different subset. | 03-25-2010 |
20100100741 | ESTABLISHING SHARED INFORMATION IN A NETWORK - A method for establishing shared information is described. The method includes estimating characteristics of a communication channel between two nodes based on signals transmitted between the nodes. The method also includes transmitting a signal from the first node to the second node, the signal being modulated with a first data sequence according to a first estimated characteristic, and transmitting a signal from the second node to the first node, the signal being modulated with a second data sequence according to a second estimated characteristic. Shared information is formed at each of the first and second nodes based on at least a portion of the first data sequence and at least a portion of the second data sequence. | 04-22-2010 |
20100111099 | COMMUNICATING IN A NETWORK THAT INCLUDES A MEDIUM HAVING VARYING TRANSMISSION CHARACTERISTICS - A method and corresponding system for operating in a network in which stations communicate over a shared medium are presented. The shared medium has at least one varying channel characteristic that varies approximately periodically. The method includes providing repeated beacon transmissions from a coordinator station for coordinating transmissions among a plurality of the stations, wherein at least some beacon transmissions are synchronized to the varying channel characteristic; and transmitting from a first station to at least one receiving station during a time slot determined based on at least one of the beacon transmissions received by the first station from the coordinator station. | 05-06-2010 |
20100124289 | TRANSMISSION SUPPRESSION - A transmission suppression apparatus includes a first modulator that converts a symbol to a waveform. The apparatus further includes a first non-linear filter, configured to at least partially compensate for non-linear distortions of a transmission signal path. The apparatus further includes a first medium coupling device for coupling signals to a communication medium. The apparatus further includes a second medium coupling device for coupling signals from the communication medium. The apparatus further includes summing circuitry with a first input connected to an output of the second medium coupling device. The apparatus further includes cancellation circuitry, connected to a second input of the summing circuit, that converts the symbol to an analog waveform that is substantially 180 degrees out of phase with the analog waveform encoding the symbol on the first input to the summing circuit. | 05-20-2010 |
20100254392 | MANAGING TRANSMISSIONS AMONG NODES COMMUNICATING OVER A SHARED COMMUNICATION MEDIUM - 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. | 10-07-2010 |
20110014910 | CHANNEL REUSE IN COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS - Disclosed are systems and methods for communicating among stations coupled to a communication medium by receiving signals from a plurality of the stations, determining signal strength values for each of the received signals based on at least a portion of the signal, and based on the signal strength values, selecting a detection threshold such that, in response to a signal having a signal strength in excess of the detection threshold, the signal is processed according to a protocol of a subset of the stations. | 01-20-2011 |
20110128973 | MEDIUM ACCESS CONTROL LAYER THAT ENCAPSULATES DATA FROM A PLURALITY OF RECEIVED DATA UNITS INTO A PLURALITY OF INDEPENDENTLY TRANSMITTABLE BLOCKS - A method of operating in a network in which a plurality of stations communicate over a shared medium, comprising providing a physical layer (e.g., PHY) for handling physical communication over the shared medium; providing a high level layer (e.g., PAL) that receives data from the station and supplies high level data units (e.g., MSDUs) for transmission over the medium; providing a MAC layer that receives the high level data units from the high level layer and supplies low level data units (e.g., MPDUs) to the physical layer; at the MAC layer, encapsulating content from a plurality of the high level data units; dividing the encapsulated content into a plurality of pieces (e.g., segments) with each piece capable of being independently retransmitted; and supplying low level data units containing one or more of the plurality of pieces. | 06-02-2011 |
20110267956 | DETECTING DELIMITERS FOR LOW-OVERHEAD COMMUNICATION IN A NETWORK - Communicating between stations over a shared medium comprises: transmitting a waveform from a first station over the shared medium at a time that is based on a shared time reference shared by multiple of the stations, the waveform including at least a first symbol, having a predetermined symbol length, comprising a first set of frequency components at predetermined carrier frequencies modulated with preamble information stored in a second station and a second set of frequency components at predetermined carrier frequencies modulated with information to be communicated to at least one station, with the carrier frequencies of the first and second sets of frequency components being integral multiples of a frequency interval determined by the inverse of the symbol length; monitoring the shared medium at a second station, before transmission of the waveform from the first station, to detect a start of the first symbol of the waveform at one of multiple time slot boundaries, the monitoring including, after each of multiple time slot boundaries, periodically sampling a series of values received over the shared medium starting at the beginning of the most recent time slot boundary and processing the sampled values to generate a metric value that indicates whether the start of the first symbol of the waveform has been detected; and in response to detecting the start of the first symbol of the waveform, demodulating the first symbol of the waveform from values sampled based on the shared time reference. | 11-03-2011 |
20110268161 | REPEATING FOR LOW-OVERHEAD COMMUNICATION IN A NETWORK - Communicating between stations over a shared medium comprises: receiving, at a destination station, a first waveform that includes one or more segments of a payload that originated from an origin station with a sequence of multiple segments, the one or more segments included in the first waveform having been transmitted over the shared medium by the origin station and by each of one or more repeater stations, and the first waveform indicating which of the sequence of multiple segments were not correctly decoded by at least one of the repeater stations; generating, based on the first waveform, acknowledgement information that specifies which of the sequence of multiple segments have been correctly decoded by the destination station; and transmitting a second waveform from the destination station over the shared medium, the second waveform including the acknowledgement information. | 11-03-2011 |
20110268200 | DELAYED ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS FOR LOW-OVERHEAD COMMUNICATION IN A NETWORK - Communicating between stations over a shared medium comprises: receiving a first waveform at a first station transmitted over the shared medium from a second station, the first waveform including a payload having multiple segments, and during reception of a first segment of the payload, initiating processing of one or more segments of the payload received before the first segment of the payload to generate acknowledgement information that specifies which of one or more segments of the payload including the one or more processed segments have been correctly decoded by the first station; transmitting a second waveform from the first station over the shared medium, the second waveform including the acknowledgement information; and transmitting a third waveform from the first station over the shared medium, after transmitting the second waveform, the third waveform including acknowledgement information that specifies which of one or more segments of the payload including the first segment of the payload have been correctly decoded by the first station. | 11-03-2011 |
20110280329 | CHANNEL ESTIMATION FOR LOW-OVERHEAD COMMUNICATION IN A NETWORK - A system for communicating between stations over a shared medium comprises: a first station comprising one or more antennas that transmit a waveform, the waveform including at least a first symbol, having a predetermined symbol length, comprising a first set of frequency components at predetermined carrier frequencies modulated with preamble information stored in a second station and a second set of frequency components at predetermined carrier frequencies modulated with information to be communicated to at least one station, with the carrier frequencies of the first and second sets of frequency components being integral multiples of a frequency interval determined by the inverse of the symbol length, wherein each of the one or more transmitting antennas transmits at least some carrier frequencies from each of the first and second sets; and at least a second station. The second station comprises one or more antennas, configured to: process sampled values from the first symbol received by each of the one or more antennas based on channel characteristics estimated from the first set of frequency components to decode information encoded on a first subset of the second set of frequency components, and process sampled values from the first symbol received by each of the one or more antennas based on channel characteristics estimated from the first set of frequency components and the first subset of the second set of frequency components to decode information encoded on a second subset of the second set of frequency components. | 11-17-2011 |
20110280332 | PROVIDING DELIMITERS FOR LOW-OVERHEAD COMMUNICATION IN A NETWORK - Transmitting a waveform over a shared medium from a first station to at least one second station comprises: forming a first portion of the waveform comprising a symbol having a predetermined symbol length, the symbol comprising a first set of frequency components at predetermined carrier frequencies modulated with preamble information stored in the second station and a second set of frequency components at predetermined carrier frequencies modulated with information to be communicated to the second station, with the carrier frequencies of the first and second sets of frequency components being integral multiples of a frequency interval determined by the inverse of the symbol length; forming a second portion of the waveform, the second portion of the waveform comprising an segment that is correlated with at least an initial segment of the first portion of the waveform; and transmitting the waveform including the second portion followed in time by the first portion over the shared medium. | 11-17-2011 |
20110286544 | LINK ADAPTATION IN MULTI-CARRIER COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS - A method for transmitting information in a multi-carrier system includes: identifying a first set of carrier signals, associated with a first code rate; and identifying a second set of carrier signals, associated with a second code rate. The method also includes partitioning a first sequence of bits representing a single symbol into a first group of bits associated with the first code rate and at least a second group of bits associated with the second code rate; interleaving a subset of bits from the first group to map multiple bits from the first group to respective carrier signals in the first set of carrier signals to achieve the first code rate; and interleaving a subset of bits from the second group to map multiple bits from the second group to respective carrier signals in the second set of carrier signals to achieve the second code rate. | 11-24-2011 |
20120093151 | COEXISTENCE MECHANISM FOR NON-COMPATIBLE POWERLINE COMMUNICATION DEVICES - A powerline network may comprise powerline communication (PLC) devices of a first class of PLC devices that are incompatible with PLC devices of a second class of PLC devices. This can result in interference between communications of the first and the second classes of PLC devices. A dual mode PLC device that is compatible with the first and the second classes of PLC devices can be implemented for coexistence with both classes of PLC devices. The dual mode PLC device can determine whether the powerline network comprises a combination of PLC devices of the first and the second classes of PLC devices. One of a plurality of packet headers that is compatible with both the classes of PLC devices can be selected for transmission in response to determining that the powerline network comprises a combination of PLC devices of the first and the second classes of PLC devices. | 04-19-2012 |
20120093240 | INTERFERENCE DETECTION IN A POWERLINE COMMUNICATION NETWORK - A powerline communication (PLC) network can be subject to noise/interference resulting in loss of throughput and data corruption for PLC devices connected to the PLC network. A powerline interference analyzer can be implemented in the PLC network for detecting sources of the noise. The powerline interference analyzer can determine powerline network noise characteristics that are representative of noise on the PLC network and can analyze the powerline network noise characteristics to determine one or more noise patterns. The noise patterns can be compared with a plurality of predefined noise signatures that are representative of corresponding each of a plurality of noise sources. Consequently, at least one noise source that is associated with the noise patterns can be identified from the plurality of the noise sources. | 04-19-2012 |
20120131360 | PATH CHARACTERISTIC BASED ASSOCIATION OF COMMUNICATION DEVICES - Associating service agents in communication over a network to one or more respective clients coupled to the network at respective ports of the network is described. At a first service agent, a first signal is received from a first client coupled to the network at a first port. The first signal propagates over a first signal propagation path between the first service agent and the first port. An association between the first service agent and the first client is established based at least in part on a difference between: the first signal propagation path between the first service agent and the first port, and a second signal propagation path between the first service agent and a second port or between a second service agent and the first port. | 05-24-2012 |
20140169186 | ADAPTIVE CHANNEL REUSE MECHANISM IN COMMUNICATION NETWORKS - A feature-capable device that supports channel reuse can execute operations for determining whether to reuse or share a communication channel with a neighbor network when a local network (that comprises the feature-capable device) and/or the neighbor network comprise legacy devices that do not support adaptive channel reuse feature. The feature-capable device can determine channel performance measurements associated with each legacy device in the local network and/or the neighbor network and can compare the channel performance measurements against corresponding performance thresholds. The local network and the neighbor network can reuse the channel if the channel performance measurements associated with all the legacy devices are in accordance with the corresponding performance thresholds. The local network and the neighbor network can share the channel if the channel performance measurements of at least one of the legacy devices is not in accordance with the corresponding performance thresholds. | 06-19-2014 |