Techniques for multipath bundling and determining Wi-Fi connections for multipath bundling

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11700657-B2
Application number	US-201916981749-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Mar 11, 2019
Priority date	Mar 19, 2018
Publication date	Jul 11, 2023
Grant date	Jul 11, 2023

Abstract

A multipath bundling system includes: a mobile terminal, comprising a Wireless Technologies Database (WTD) and a processor configured to run a multipath bundling protocol (MBP); and a network entity, wherein the network entity is an external server or a multipath bundling server, and wherein the network entity comprises a Self-Learning Wi-Fi Database (SLWD). The mobile terminal and/or the network entity is configured to run a Search-Compare-Assign Algorithm (SCAA). Running the SCAA includes: receiving input data from the WTD and/or the SLWD, the input data indicating information about wireless technologies, including information about at least one cellular connection and at least one Wi-Fi connection, usable by the mobile terminal for multipath bundling; and determining at least one Wi-Fi connection usable by the mobile terminal for multipath bundling based on the received input data in accordance with an optimization criterion.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A multipath bundling system, comprising:
a mobile terminal, comprising:
a Wireless Technologies Database (WTD) configured to store information relating to wireless technologies discovered by the mobile terminal and usable by the mobile terminal to initiate a wireless connection; and
a processor configured to run a multipath bundling protocol (MBP); and

a network entity, wherein the network entity is an external server or a multipath bundling server, and wherein the network entity comprises a Self-Learning Wi-Fi Database (SLWD) configured to store information relating to network-known wireless technologies, including credentials for secured Wi-Fi networks learned from a plurality of mobile terminals;
wherein the mobile terminal is configured to:
after movement of the mobile terminal, detect one or more secured Wi-Fi networks having Wi-Fi credentials unknown to the mobile terminal;
obtain respective Wi-Fi credentials for a respective secured Wi-Fi network from the SLWD of the network entity;
determine that the respective secured Wi-Fi network is to be used for multipath bundling based on an optimization criterion, wherein the optimization criterion specifies that data is to be offloaded from a cellular path to a Wi-Fi path; and
use the respective secured Wi-Fi network for multipath bundling based on the obtained Wi-Fi credentials; and

wherein the WTD and the SLWD are configured to perform a self-learning process where the SLWD learns about Wi-Fi connections suitable for the mobile terminal from the WTD and the WTD learns from the SLWD about credentials for connecting to an optimal Wi-Fi network.

2. The multipath bundling system of claim 1 , wherein the mobile terminal is further configured to obtain, from the SLWD and/or the WTD, at least one of the following:
a Wi-Fi Service Set Identifier (SSID) of the respective secured Wi-Fi network;
link quality of the Wi-Fi SSID;
geolocation of the Wi-Fi SSID;
channel characteristics of at least one cellular connection; or
information about at least one Bluetooth connection.

3. The multipath bundling system of claim 1 , wherein the mobile terminal is configured to determine at least one Wi-Fi access point in a local environment of the mobile terminal and to store information about the at least one Wi-Fi access point in the WTD of the mobile terminal.

4. The multipath bundling system of claim 3 , wherein the WTD of the mobile terminal is configured to expand the SLWD with the information about the at least one Wi-Fi access point.

5. The multipath bundling system of claim 3 , wherein the mobile terminal is configured to receive credentials for the at least one Wi-Fi access point from an authentication server via a cellular, Wi-Fi or MBP connection, and to store the credentials in the WTD of the mobile terminal.

6. The multipath bundling system of claim 5 , wherein the WTD is configured to expand or update the SLWD with the credentials for the at least one Wi-Fi access point.

7. The multipath bundling system of claim 1 , wherein the mobile terminal and/or the network entity is further configured to:
search for an optimal Wi-Fi parameter set for the mobile terminal based on comparing the input data received from the WTD and/or the SLWD in accordance with the optimization criterion; and
assign known credentials to the optimal Wi-Fi parameter set.

8. The multipath bundling system of claim 1 , wherein the mobile terminal is configured to connect to both at least one cellular connection and at least one Wi-Fi connection based on a priority of a Wi-Fi connection over a cellular connection.

9. A multipath bundling method, comprising:
after movement of a mobile terminal, detecting, by the mobile terminal, one or more secured Wi-Fi networks having Wi-Fi credentials unknown to the mobile terminal, wherein the mobile terminal comprises a Wireless Technologies Database (WTD), wherein the WTD stores information relating to wireless technologies discovered by the mobile terminal and usable by the mobile terminal to initiate a wireless connection;
obtaining, by the mobile terminal, respective Wi-Fi credentials for a respective secured Wi-Fi network from a Self-Learning Wi-Fi Database (SLWD) of a network entity, wherein the network entity is an external server or a multipath bundling server, and wherein the SLWD stores information relating to network-known wireless technologies, including credentials for secured Wi-Fi networks learned from a plurality of mobile terminals;
determining, by the mobile terminal, that the respective secured Wi-Fi network is to be used for multipath bundling based on an optimization criterion, wherein the optimization criterion specifies that data is to be offloaded from a cellular path to a Wi-Fi path; and
using, by the mobile terminal, the respective secured Wi-Fi network for multipath bundling based on the obtained Wi-Fi credentials;
wherein the method further comprises: performing, by the WTD and the SLWD, a self-learning process where the SLWD learns about Wi-Fi connections suitable for the mobile terminal from the WTD and the WTD learns from the SLWD about credentials for connecting to an optimal Wi-Fi network.

10. The multipath bundling method of claim 9 , further comprising:
searching for an optimal Wi-Fi parameter set for the mobile terminal based on input data received from the WTD of the mobile terminal and/or from the SLWD and the optimization criterion; and
assigning known credentials to the optimal Wi-Fi parameter set.

Assignees

• Deutsche Telekom Ag

Inventors

• Bogenfeld Eckard
• Amend Markus

Classifications

• H04W76/15 Primary

  Setup of multiple wireless link connections · CPC title

• H04W84/12

  WLAN [Wireless Local Area Networks] · CPC title

• H04L69/14

  Multichannel or multilink protocols · CPC title