PMIP protocol enhancement

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9749838-B2
Application number	US-201213508544-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 26, 2012
Priority date	Aug 17, 2011
Publication date	Aug 29, 2017
Grant date	Aug 29, 2017

Abstract

Example embodiments presented herein are directed towards determining a Proxy Mobile Internet Protocol version 6 (PIMPv6) control plane used by a network node peer in an Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) transport network. The example embodiments provide a mechanism in PMIP protocol stack, to allow a Mobility Access Gateway/Local Mobility Anchor (MAG/LMA) node such as SGW (which may be supporting both PMIP draft and PMIP RFC) to decide which PMIP protocol stack shall be used to communicate to the peer node, i.e. LMA/MAG.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method in a first network peer node for determining a Proxy Mobile Internet Protocol version 6 (PMIPv6) control plane used by a second network peer node, the first and second network peer nodes being in an Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) transport network, the method comprising:
sending, to the second network peer node, a first communication message in a first control plane format, said first control plane format being one of: a control plane format according to Request For Comment (RFC) 5844 (RFC Control Plane Format) and a control plane format according to a draft of RFC 5844 (Draft RFC Control Plane Format);
obtaining first information with respect to the first communication message, the first information indicating one of: 1) that the second network peer responded to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said first control plane format and 2) that the second network node did not respond to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said first control plane format; and
determining, using said obtained first information, whether the second network peer node is: a) utilizing a first version of the PMIPv6 control plane or a second version of the PMIPv6 control plane or b) not utilizing either the first version or the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane, wherein the first version of the PMIPv6 control plane is a version corresponding to RFC 5844 and the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane is a version corresponding to a draft of RFC 5844.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein
the first network peer node is a Mobile Access Gateway (MAG) node,
the second network peer node is a Local Mobility Anchor (LMA) node, and
the communication message is a Heartbeat message or a proxy binding update request.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein
the first network peer node is a Local Mobility Anchor (LMA) node,
the second network peer node is a Mobile Access Gateway (MAG) node, and
the communication message is a Heartbeat message.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein
the obtained first information indicates that the second network node did not respond to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said first control plane format, and
the method further comprises sending, to the second network peer node, a second communication message in a second control plane format that is different than the first control plane format, wherein
the sending of the second communication message is performed as a result of obtaining said first information indicating that the second network node did not respond to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said first control plane format, and
said second control plane format being one of: an RFC Control Plane Format and a Draft RFC Control Plane Format.

5. The method of claim 4 , further comprising:
after sending the second communication message, obtaining second information with respect to the second communication message, the second information indicating one of: 1) that the second network peer responded to the second communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said second control plane format and 2) that the second network node did not respond to the second communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said second control plane format; and
determining, using said obtained second information, whether the second network peer node is: a) utilizing a first version of the PMIPv6 control plane or a second version of the PMIPv6 control plane or b) not utilizing either the first version or the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane, wherein the first version of the PMIPv6 control plane is a version corresponding to RFC 5844 and the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane is a version corresponding to a draft of RFC 5844.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein
the obtained second information indicates that the second network node did not respond to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said second control plane format, and
as a result of said second information indicating that the second network node did not respond to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said second control plane format, it is determined that the second network peer node is not utilizing either the first version or the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane.

7. The method of claim 5 , wherein
said second control plane format is said Draft RFC Control Plane Format,
the obtained second information indicates that the second network peer responded to the second communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said second control plane format, and
as a result of said second information indicating that that the second network peer responded to the second communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said second control plane format, it is determined that the second network peer node is utilizing the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein
the obtained second information indicates that the second network peer responded to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said first control plane format,
as a result of said first information indicating that that the second network peer responded to the first communication message by transmitting a responsive communication message in said first control plane format, it is determined that the second network peer node is utilizing one of the first version of the PMIPv6 control plane and the second version of the PMIPv6 control plane.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
sending, to the second network peer node, a second communication message in a second control plane format, said second control plane format being a control plane format according the RFC Control Plane Format, wherein
said first control plane format is a control plane format according to the Draft RFC Control Plane Format, and
the second communication message is sent prior to obtaining said first information.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein if only one communication response is received from the second network peer node, the determining further comprises determining the PIMPv6 control plane value to be the control plane format of the received communication response.

11. The method of claim 9 , wherein if a plurality of communication responses are received from the second network peer node, the determining further comprises determining the PIMPv6 control plane value to be a default control plane format.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the default control plane format is control plane A.

13. The method of claim 9 , wherein if no responses from the second network peer node are received within a predetermined period of time, the communication response is an internal notification that indicates communication with the second network peer node is not possible, and the determining further comprises determining the PIMPv6 control plane is a null value.

14. The method of claim 4 , wherein the first control plane format is control plane A and the second control plane format is control plane C.

15. A first network peer node for determining a Proxy Mobile Internet Protocol version 6 (PMIPv6) control plane used by a second network peer node, the first and second network peer nodes being in an Internet

Assignees

• Qiang Zu
• Yang Yong
• ERICSSON TELEFON AB L M (publ)

Inventors

• Qiang Zu
• Yang Yong

Classifications

• H04W8/085 Primary

  involving hierarchical organized mobility servers, e.g. hierarchical mobile IP [HMIP] · CPC title