User equipment assistance information for voice over cellular

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12484101-B2
Application number	US-202318234641-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 16, 2023
Priority date	Jun 25, 2019
Publication date	Nov 25, 2025
Grant date	Nov 25, 2025

Abstract

Disclosed are methods, systems, apparatus, and computer programs for providing a network with assistance information from a user equipment (UE) that is participating in a multimedia telephony session. In one aspect, a method includes determining a connection parameter of a multimedia telephony session between a user equipment (UE) and a remote UE. The method further includes generating assistance information based on the connection parameter. Yet further, the method include sending, using a medium access control (MAC) control element, the assistance information to an access node (AN) serving the UE.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method comprising:
generating user equipment (UE) assistance information based on at least one of (i) an audio quality of a multimedia telephony session between a UE and a remote UE or (ii) an end-to-end delay measurement of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE, the UE assistance information comprising a request for an access node (AN) to adjust a delay budget of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE; selecting a radio bearer to use for transmission of the UE assistance information based at least on a dual connectivity mode of the UE; and transmitting radio resource control (RRC) signaling to the AN via the selected radio bearer, the RRC signaling comprising the UE assistance information that indicates the request for the AN to adjust the delay budget of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the RRC signaling indicates an action to be performed by the AN, the action comprising at least one of: enabling data duplication, changing a default radio link control (RLC) bearer of a Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) entity of the UE, enabling transmission time interval (TTI) bundling, or lowering a Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS).

3 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
selecting the action based on at least one of: a radio resource availability, Evolved-Universal Terrestrial Radio Access-New Radio (EUTRA-NR) Dual Connectivity (EN-DC) support, a radio link quality, a type of fading, or a number of users to be served by the AN.

4 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining, based on a feedback from a jitter buffer, a robustness indicator; and sending, to the AN, the robustness indicator.

5 . The method of claim 4 , wherein the feedback comprises information relating to (iii) a packet drop rate and (iv) a robustness of a codec to packet loss.

6 . The method of claim 4 , wherein sending the robustness indicator to the AN comprises: sending the robustness indicator using at least one of: radio resource control (RRC) signaling, a PDCP control message over the radio bearer, or a medium access control (MAC) control element (CE).

7 . The method of claim 4 , wherein sending the robustness indicator to the AN comprises:
sending the robustness indicator from a media layer management engine of the UE to a cellular protocol stack of the UE; and sending the robustness indicator from the cellular protocol stack to the AN.

8 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
communicating with the remote UE using a radio resource allocated by the AN based on the UE assistance information.

9 . One or more processors configured to perform operations comprising:
generating user equipment (UE) assistance information based on at least one of (i) an audio quality of a multimedia telephony session between a UE and a remote UE or (ii) an end-to-end delay measurement of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE, the UE assistance information comprising a request for an access node (AN) to adjust a delay budget of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE; selecting a radio bearer to use for transmission of the UE assistance information based at least on a dual connectivity mode of the UE; and transmitting radio resource control (RRC) signaling to the AN via the selected radio bearer, the RRC signaling comprising the UE assistance information that indicates the request for the AN to adjust the delay budget of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE.

10 . The one or more processors of claim 9 , wherein the RRC signaling indicates an action to be performed by the AN, the action comprising at least one of: enabling data duplication, changing a default radio link control (RLC) bearer of a Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) entity of the UE, enabling transmission time interval (TTI) bundling, or lowering a Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS).

11 . The one or more processors of claim 10 , further comprising:
selecting the action based on at least one of: a radio resource availability, Evolved-Universal Terrestrial Radio Access-New Radio (EUTRA-NR) Dual Connectivity (EN-DC) support, a radio link quality, a type of fading, or a number of users to be served.

12 . The one or more processors of claim 9 , the operations further comprising:
determining, based on a feedback from a jitter buffer, a robustness indicator; and sending, to the AN, the robustness indicator.

13 . The one or more processors of claim 12 , wherein the feedback comprises information relating to (iii) a packet drop rate and (iv) a robustness of a codec to packet loss.

14 . The one or more processors of claim 12 , wherein sending the robustness indicator to the AN comprises: sending the robustness indicator using at least one of: radio resource control (RRC) signaling, a PDCP control message over the radio bearer, or a medium access control (MAC) control element (CE).

15 . The one or more processors of claim 12 , wherein sending the robustness indicator to the AN comprises:
sending the robustness indicator from a media layer management engine of the UE to a cellular protocol stack of the UE; and sending the robustness indicator from the cellular protocol stack to the AN.

16 . The one or more processors of claim 9 , the operations further comprising:
communicating with the remote UE using a radio resource allocated by the AN based on the UE assistance information.

17 . An apparatus, comprising:
a transceiver configured to receive radio resource control (RRC) signaling comprising user equipment (UE) assistance information via a radio bearer, the UE assistance information comprising a request to adjust a delay budget of a multimedia telephony session between a UE and a remote UE, wherein the request is triggered by at least one of (i) an audio quality of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE or (ii) an end-to-end delay measurement of the multimedia telephony session, and wherein the radio bearer used for transmission of the UE assistance information is selected based at least on a dual connectivity mode of the UE; and a processor configured to adjust the delay budget of the multimedia telephony session between the UE and the remote UE in accordance with the UE assistance information provided via the RRC signaling on the selected radio bearer.

18 . The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein the transceiver is configured to receive a robustness indicator from the UE.

Assignees

• Apple Inc

Inventors

• Parron Jerome
• Zhang Yujian
• Oyman Ozgur

Classifications

• H04W72/542

  using measured or perceived quality · CPC title

• H04L43/0858

  One way delays · CPC title

• H04L43/0835

  One way packet loss · CPC title

• H04L65/65

  Network streaming protocols, e.g. real-time transport protocol [RTP] or real-time control protocol [RTCP] · CPC title

• H04W28/0278

  using buffer status reports (dynamic wireless traffic scheduling definition H04W72/12) · CPC title