Small cell edge computing platform

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10587721-B2
Application number	US-201514839130-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 28, 2015
Priority date	Aug 28, 2015
Publication date	Mar 10, 2020
Grant date	Mar 10, 2020

Abstract

A small cell may include a base station that may be co-located with an edge computing device. The edge computing device may be integrated within a small cell base station or be a physically separate module communicatively coupled to and in close proximity with the small cell base station that provides edge computing resources at the small cell. The processing responsibilities associated with received data may be split or divided between the edge computing device and a target mobile device. For example, a portion of data processing may be performed by the edge computing device and the remaining portion of data processing may be performed by the target mobile device. The distribution of processing responsibilities may be based on radio link conditions or conditions (e.g., power state or processing capabilities) associated with the target mobile device.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for wireless communication, comprising:
receiving a plurality of versions of data to be delivered to a mobile device in a first small cell, the plurality of versions of data compressed with a first compression algorithm and comprising different versions of the same data; and
distributing processing of the plurality of versions of data between computing resources of the mobile device and computing resources of an edge computing device based at least in part on a processing capability of the mobile device, wherein the edge computing device is co-located with a first base station of the first small cell or a second base station of a neighboring second small cell that is in communication with the first small cell, and wherein distributing the processing of the plurality of versions of data between the computing resources comprises:
selecting a version of data of the plurality of versions of data to transmit to the mobile device based at least in part on an operating context of the mobile device or a quality of a radio link used for communication between the mobile device and the first base station;
decompressing the version of data compressed with the first compression algorithm; and
recompressing the decompressed version of data according to a second compression algorithm that has a lower compression level than the first compression algorithm and that is based at least in part on the processing capability of the mobile device and the quality of the radio link used for communication between the mobile device and the first base station.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining the quality of the radio link between the mobile device and the first base station; and
transmitting the recompressed version of data to the mobile device.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the operating context comprises at least one of a user preference, a power state of the mobile device, a processing headroom of the mobile device, or a time of day.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
observing a condition of the radio link used for communication between the mobile device and the first base station; and
determining the quality of the radio link based at least in part on the condition of the radio link.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving, at the edge computing device, an indication of an operating context of the mobile device; and
allocating a processing distribution between the computing resources of the mobile device and the computing resources of the edge computing device based at least in part on the indication.

6. The method of claim 5 , further comprising:
comparing the indication against a threshold associated with the operating context of the mobile device, wherein the threshold is a processing availability threshold, a power availability threshold, or a temperature threshold.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a processing capability report from the mobile device; and
processing the plurality of versions of data based at least in part on the processing capability report.

8. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving video data;
determining the quality of the radio link between the mobile device and the first base station; and
rendering the video data based at least in part on the quality of the radio link.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving audio data for the mobile device;
decompressing audio data for transmission to the mobile device, the decompressing based at least in part on the quality of the radio link; and
transmitting the decompressed audio data to the mobile device for playback on the mobile device.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein wireless communication resources of the first base station are housed in a first module; and
the edge computing device is housed in a second module in communication with and co-located with the first module.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein:
the first small cell is one of a first picocell, a first femtocell, a first microcell, or a first Wi-Fi access point; and
the neighboring second small cell is one of a second picocell, a second femtocell, a second microcell, or a second Wi-Fi access point.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first small cell comprises a wireless wide area network (WWAN) transceiver and a wireless local area network (WLAN) transceiver.

13. An apparatus for wireless communication at a wireless device, comprising:
means for receiving a plurality of versions of data to be delivered to a mobile device in a first small cell, the plurality of versions of data compressed with a first compression algorithm and comprising different versions of the same data; and
means for distributing processing of the plurality of versions of data between computing resources of the mobile device and computing resources of an edge computing device based at least in part on a processing capability of the mobile device, wherein the edge computing device is co-located with a first base station of the first small cell or a second base station of a neighboring second small cell that is in communication with the first small cell, and wherein the means for distributing the processing of the plurality of versions of data between the computing resources comprises:
means for selecting a version of data of the plurality of versions of data to transmit to the mobile device based at least in part on an operating context of the mobile device or a quality of a radio link used for communication between the mobile device and the first base station;
means for decompressing the version of data compressed with the first compression algorithm; and
means for recompressing the decompressed version of data according to a second compression algorithm that has a lower compression level than the first compression algorithm and that is based at least in part on the processing capability of the mobile device and the quality of the radio link used for communication between the mobile device and the first base station.

14. The apparatus of claim 13 , further comprising:
means for determining the quality of the radio link between the mobile device and the first base station; and
means for transmitting the recompressed version of data to the mobile device.

15. The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein the operating context comprises at least one of a user preference, a power state of the mobile device, a processing headroom of the mobile device, or a time of day.

16. The apparatus of claim 13 , further comprising:
means for observing a condition of the radio link used for communication between the mobile device and the first base station; and
means for determining the quality of the radio link based at least in part on the condition of the radio link.

17. The apparatus of claim 13 , further comprising:
means for receiving, at the edge computing device, an indication of an operating context of the mobile device; and
means for allocating a processing distribution between the computing resources of the mobile device and the computing resources of the edge computing device based at least in part on the indication.

18. The apparatus of claim 17 , further comprising:
means for comparing the indication against a threshold associated with the operating context of the mobile device, wherein the threshold is a processing availability threshold, a power availability threshold, or a temperature threshold.

19. The apparatus of claim 13 , further comprising:
means for receiv

Assignees

• Qualcomm Inc

Inventors

• Das Soumya
• Park Edwin Chongwoo

Classifications

• H04W84/045

  using private Base Stations, e.g. femto Base Stations, home Node B · CPC title

• H04W4/18 Primary

  Information format or content conversion, e.g. adaptation by the network of the transmitted or received information for the purpose of wireless delivery to users or terminals · CPC title

• H04L67/322 Primary

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04L67/61 Primary

  taking into account QoS or priority requirements · CPC title

• H04W24/08

  Testing, {supervising or monitoring} using real traffic · CPC title