Method and computer program for offloading execution of computing tasks of a wireless equipment

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10013282-B2
Application number	US-201415034770-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 3, 2014
Priority date	Nov 5, 2013
Publication date	Jul 3, 2018
Grant date	Jul 3, 2018

Abstract

A method of processing a computing task required by wireless equipment of a cellular communication network, including classifying the task in at least one class of immediate offloaded execution and a class of immediate local execution, by traversing oriented graph decision nodes and terminal nodes each assigned to one of the classes, the decision nodes being distributed into at least three hierarchical levels themselves distributed into at least three subsets of levels. Traversal of the graph includes: during transit through any decision node of a first subset of levels, verification of a feasibility criterion for the offloading of the task for execution by third-party equipment; during transit through any decision node of a second subset of levels, verification of a criticality criterion for execution of the task, and during transit through any decision node of a third subset of levels, verification of an opportunity criterion for execution of the task.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method of processing computing tasks generated by a software application which is executed by a wireless equipment of a cellular communication network, the method comprising for each of the computing tasks:
classifying the task in a class belonging to a group of classes formed from at least one class of immediate offloaded execution, one class of deferred offloaded execution, one class of immediate local execution and one class of deferred local execution;
if the task belongs to the class of immediate offloaded execution, transmitting an offload execution request for the execution of the task by a third-party equipment of the cellular communication network; and
if the task belongs to the class of immediate local execution, performing prioritized execution of the task by the wireless equipment;
the classifying being performed by traversing an oriented graph of decision nodes, each having successor nodes in the graph and terminal nodes, each assigned to one of the classes of the group, the decision nodes being distributed into at least three hierarchical levels, themselves distributed into at least three subsets of levels, traversal of the graph taking place from an initial decision node to reach a terminal node, and comprising:
during transit through a decision node of a first subset of levels, verification of a feasibility criterion for offloading of the task for execution by the third-party equipment item, whereby if the feasibility criterion is verified, execution of the task can be offloaded, while if the feasibility criterion is not verified, execution of the task cannot be offloaded;
during transit through a decision node of a second subset of levels, verification of a criticality criterion for execution of the task, whereby if the criticality criterion is verified, execution of the task is to be immediate, while if the criticality criterion is not verified, execution of the task can be deferred; and
during transit through a decision node of a third subset of levels, verification of an opportunity criterion for execution of the task.

2. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising, when the offload execution request is accepted by the third-party equipment, receiving, by the wireless equipment, an authorization message authorizing the offloaded execution of the task.

3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the verification of a feasibility criterion for the offloading of the task for execution by the third-party equipment comprises a measurement of the quality of the communication channel between the wireless equipment and the cellular communication network, the feasibility criterion not being verified if the measured quality is less than a threshold.

4. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the verification of a criticality criterion for the execution of the task comprises determination of latency of the task, the criticality criterion not being verified if the determined latency is greater than a threshold.

5. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising verification of a criticality criterion for the execution of the task by the wireless equipment.

6. The method according to claim 5 , wherein the criticality criterion for the execution of the task by the wireless equipment is verified when a power level of a battery of the wireless equipment is less than a threshold, or when execution of the task consumes more than a given percentage of the power level of the battery, or when memory needs for the task are greater than a percentage of available memory of the wireless equipment, or when the task requires processing capacities that exceed a percentage of processing capacities of the wireless equipment.

7. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the verification of an opportunity criterion for the offloading of the task comprises verifying the opportunity criterion for the offloading of the task for execution by the third-party equipment.

8. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the verification of the opportunity criterion for the offloading of the task for execution by the third-party equipment comprises a comparison between connectivity status of the wireless equipment with the cellular communication network and a mean connectivity status.

9. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the verification of the opportunity criterion for the offloading of the task for execution by the third-party equipment item comprises a comparison between quantity of power consumed if the execution of the task is offloaded to the third-party equipment and quantity of power consumed if the execution of the task is performed locally by the wireless equipment.

10. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the verification of an opportunity criterion for the execution of the task comprises verifying the opportunity criterion for the execution of the task by the wireless equipment.

11. The method according to claim 10 , wherein the opportunity criterion for the execution of the task by the wireless equipment is not verified when a power level of a battery of the wireless equipment is less than a threshold, or when execution of the task consumes more than a given percentage of the power level of the battery, or when memory needs for the task are greater than a percentage of available memory of the wireless equipment, or when the task requires processing capacities that exceed a percentage of processing capacities of the wireless equipment.

12. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the wireless equipment is a mobile user equipment item and the third-party equipment is a local access point to the cellular communication network covering a microcell, a picocell or a femtocell, or a relay to the local access point.

13. A non-transitory computer program product comprising computer code instructions for executing the classifying of the method according to claim 1 , when the computer code instructions are executed on a computer.

Assignees

• Commissariat Energie Atomique
• Univ Degli Studi Di Roma “La Sapienza”

Inventors

• Calvanese Strinati Emilio
• Barbarossa Sergio
• Oueis Jessica

Classifications

• G06F9/4843 Primary

  by program, e.g. task dispatcher, supervisor, operating system · CPC title

• G06F9/4881 Primary

  Scheduling strategies for dispatcher, e.g. round robin, multi-level priority queues · CPC title

• H04L67/10

  in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network (software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46) · CPC title

• Y02D10/24

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• Y02D10/00

  Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management · CPC title