RU2802678C1 - Channel switching method, electronic device and storage medium - Google Patents

Abstract

FIELD: communication technologies

SUBSTANCE: according to this channel switching method, the first application is launched, which contains the first, the second, and the third data streams transmitted over the first network channel. If it is determined that the quality of the network for the first data stream does not satisfy the predetermined condition, the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream is switched to the second network channel, and the third data stream is carried unchanged by the first network channel.

EFFECT: reduced delay in the operation of services.

13 cl, 29 dwg, 2 tbl, 1 ex

Description

Field of technology to which the invention relates

The present application relates to the field of communication technology, and in particular to a channel switching method and a data storage medium.

State of the art

With the rapid development of electronic and Internet technologies, mobile devices such as mobile phones are increasingly used in people's daily lives. For example, mobile phones can be used to make mobile payments and play games. To enable common services (such as games, calls, and social software) to function properly, users' mobile phones are typically connected to wireless (radio) communications networks. However, in some scenarios, modern radio networks do not sufficiently meet the needs of such services (for example, the mobile phone signal becomes weak and of insufficient quality), which leads to delays in the operation of services and can degrade the user experience.

Disclosure of the invention

The present application provides a channel switching method, an electronic device, and a storage medium that can reduce service latency and improve the user experience.

According to a first aspect, one embodiment of the present application provides a channel switching method applicable to an electronic device, wherein the electronic device has a first network channel and a second network channel, and the method comprises: launching a first application, wherein the first application contains a first data stream and a second data stream, and the first data stream and the second data stream are transmitted over the first network channel; and switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel if it is determined that the network performance of the first data stream does not satisfy a predetermined condition. According to this method, when it is determined that the quality of the network for the first data stream does not satisfy a given condition, not only the network channel carrying the first data stream is switched to the second network channel, but also the network channel carrying the second data stream is switched to this second network channel , which not only solves the service operation delay problem that may be caused by poor network performance for the first data flow, but also solves the service operation delay problem that may be caused by poor network performance for the second data flow, thereby reducing the service operation delay and improving the user experience.

In one possible implementation, the first data stream and the second data stream are data streams sensitive to the same parameter, where the parameter is at least one of latency, packet loss rate, data rate, or frequency bandwidth. According to the present method, the first data stream and the second data stream are sensitive to the same parameter, such that the second data stream, which is sensitive to the same parameter as the first data stream, is switched to a second network channel along with the first stream.

In one possible implementation, the procedure for determining that the network performance for the first data flow does not satisfy a predetermined condition comprises: determining, in accordance with a parameter to which the first data flow is sensitive, that the network performance for the first data flow does not satisfy pre-specified condition.

In one possible embodiment, the procedure for determining, in accordance with a parameter to which the first data stream is sensitive, that the network quality of the first data stream does not satisfy a predetermined condition, comprises: obtaining a data packet from the first data flow from a plurality of data packets, transmitted over the first network channel; calculating a parameter to which the first data stream is sensitive in accordance with the received data packet; and determining that the calculated parameter does not satisfy a predetermined condition corresponding to the parameter.

In one possible implementation, a procedure for obtaining a data packet from a first data stream of a plurality of data packets transmitted over a first network channel comprises: obtaining data packets transmitted over a first network channel; determining that identification information corresponding to the first application is present in these data packets; and determining that the data packets include a matching function with the first data stream.

In one possible embodiment, before switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel, the method further comprises: obtaining the network channels available in the electronic device, in addition to the first network channel, in the event of changes being detected in the environment; accordingly performing an assessment of the quality of these network channels that are in an available state; selecting a second network channel with the best quality as an alternative network channel in accordance with the results of quality evaluation; and activation of this alternative network channel.

In one possible implementation, a procedure for switching a network channel carrying a first data stream and a second data stream to a second network channel comprises: switching if it is determined that a second network channel is present, that it is activated and is being used as an alternative network channel, a network a channel carrying a first data stream and a second data stream to the second network channel.

In one possible embodiment, the procedure for switching a network channel carrying a first data stream and a second data stream to a second network channel further comprises: obtaining network channels that are available in an electronic device other than the first network channel if it is determined that there are no activated alternative network channel; accordingly performing an assessment of the quality of these network channels that are in an available state; selecting a second network channel with the best quality as an alternative network channel in accordance with the results of quality evaluation; activating a second network channel used as an alternative network channel; and switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel.

In one exemplary embodiment, before determining that the network quality of the first data flow does not satisfy a predetermined condition, the method further comprises: determining that the first application is an application from a predetermined white list.

In one possible embodiment, the first network channel is a Wi-Fi channel or a cellular channel, and the second network channel is a Wi-Fi channel or a cellular channel.

In one possible implementation, the first application is a gaming application, the first data stream is a stream of voice messages between players (hereinafter referred to as the voice stream), and the second data stream is a stream of game interaction (players "fight" with each other) between players (hereinafter referred to as the game flow); or the first application is a video playback application, in which case the first data stream is an audio stream (hereinafter referred to as a voice stream), and the second data stream is a video stream.

According to a second aspect, one embodiment of the present application provides an electronic device comprising:

CPU; and a storage device, where the storage device is configured to store computer program code, the computer program code contains instructions, the electronic device has multiple network channels, the electronic device has a first network channel and a second network channel, and the electronic device when it reads the commands from the storage device, implements the method according to the first aspect.

According to a third aspect, one embodiment of the present application provides a computer-readable storage medium, wherein the computer-readable storage medium stores a computer program such that when a computer executes the computer program, the computer implements the method according to the first aspect.

According to a fourth aspect, one embodiment of the present application provides a computer program such that the computer program is configured to, when executed by a computer, implement the method of the first aspect.

In one possible embodiment, the program of the fourth aspect may be stored in whole or in part on a storage medium located in the same housing as the processor, or it can be stored in whole or in part in a storage device not located in the same housing as the processor.

Brief description of drawings

To more clearly describe the technical solutions of the embodiments of this application, the accompanying drawings required to describe these embodiments are briefly listed below. It is understood that the accompanying drawings in the following description show only some embodiments of the present invention, and that even one of ordinary skill in the art will be able to derive other drawings from these accompanying drawings without much creative effort:

fig. 1 represents a simplified flow switching diagram in the prior art;

fig. 2 represents a simplified flow switching diagram according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 3a is a simplified view of a mobile phone desktop display according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 3b is a simplified view of the application interface according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 3c is a simplified view of an application interface on a mobile phone using a primary network channel according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 3d is a simplified view of an application interface on a mobile phone using an alternative network channel according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 4 is a simplified diagram of the hardware structure of an electronic device according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 5 represents a simplified diagram of the software architecture of an electronic device according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 6 is a simplified diagram of another electronic device software architecture according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 7 is a simplified logic diagram of one embodiment of a channel switching method according to the present application;

fig. 8 is a simplified block diagram of a periodic control packet flow according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 9 represents a simplified scheme for counting game stream packets according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 10 is a simplified block diagram of a game stream packet flow according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 11a - fig. 11c represent simplified flow switching circuits according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 12 is a flow chart of interactions between components of an electronic device according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 13 is another flow diagram of interactions between components of an electronic device according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 14a and fig. 14b represents another flow diagram of interactions between components of an electronic device according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 15 represents a simplified diagram of the operating principle of a traffic reporting component according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 16a is a simplified diagram of a flow of periodic control packets at 1 s intervals according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 16b is a simplified diagram of a method for calculating round trip time for periodic control bursts;

fig. 17a represents a simplified code diagram for implementing a registration hook function according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 17b is a simplified code diagram for implementing a registration hook function according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 18 represents a simplified diagram of the code implementation of the matching function according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 19 represents a simplified diagram of a code implementation of filtering data packets according to one embodiment of the present application;

fig. 20 represents a simplified diagram of the code implementation of transmitting a target stream and the result of assessing the quality of network operation for this target stream according to one of the variants of this application; And

fig. 21 shows a simplified code implementation diagram for obtaining a stream to be switched, according to one embodiment of the present application.

Carrying out the invention

Below, technical solutions according to variants of this application are described with reference to the attached drawings of these variants of the application. In the descriptions of embodiments of this application, the symbol "/" means "or" unless otherwise indicated. For example, A/B may represent A or B. The combination "and/or" used here specifies only an association relation to describe associated objects and represents that three relations may exist. For example, A and/or B could represent the following three cases: Only A exists, both A and B exist, and only B exists.

The terms “first” and “second” mentioned below are for descriptive purposes only and should not be understood as indicating or implying relative importance or as implying the number of technical features identified. Therefore, the elements defined as "first" and "second" may explicitly or implicitly contain one or more elements. As used herein, "several of" means two or more.

First, the terms used in the embodiments of this application are used as examples and not limitations.

A Wi-Fi network card is a device that supports Internet access via a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN).

A data service network card is a device that supports Internet access using mobile communications technologies such as General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), an evolution of the GSM standard with an increased data rate (Enhanced Data Rate for GSM). Evolution, EDGE), Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-SCDMA), High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), Wideband Multiple Access code division multiple access (WCDMA), long-term evolution (LTE) and 5th Generation Mobile Communication Technology (5G).

A network link is any route between two or more nodes in a communications network, or a route from a source address to a destination address in a communications network.

A network link of an electronic device in embodiments of the present application refers to a route established between a device using the above-mentioned Wi-Fi network card or data service network card or the like. to access the Internet, and other electronic device such as a server. In embodiments of the present application, a network channel established using a Wi-Fi network card is called a Wi-Fi channel, and a network channel established using a data service network card is called a cellular channel.

An electronic device may be pre-configured with several network channels. For example, this collection of multiple network channels may comprise a primary Wi-Fi channel, a secondary Wi-Fi channel, a primary cellular channel, and a secondary cellular channel. The primary Wi-Fi channel and secondary Wi-Fi channel can operate in the 2.4 GHz frequency range or in the 5 GHz frequency range. For example, if the primary Wi-Fi channel operates in the 2.4 GHz frequency range, the secondary Wi-Fi channel operates in the 5 GHz frequency range; and if the primary Wi-Fi channel operates in the 5 GHz frequency range, the secondary Wi-Fi channel operates in the 2.4 GHz frequency range. In addition, the primary cellular channel and the secondary cellular channel may correspond to carrier networks. For example, the primary cellular link may use SIM 1 (that SIM 1 belongs to Carrier A), and the secondary cellular link may use SIM 2 (that SIM 2 belongs to Carrier B). In general, the priority of the primary Wi-Fi channel is higher than the priorities of the other three channels. Therefore, the primary network channel is usually the primary Wi-Fi channel. In general, given the data traffic consumption of an electronic device, the priority of the Wi-Fi channel is higher than the priority of the cellular channel. It may be understood that such preconfigured channels are examples for description purposes only and are not limiting to the embodiments of the present application. In some embodiments, more or fewer channels may be additionally included. In addition, the use of the primary Wi-Fi channel as the primary network channel is only a preferred technical solution and does not constitute a limitation on the embodiments of the present application. In some embodiments, other network channels may alternatively be selected as the primary network channels.

With the rapid development of electronic and Internet technologies, mobile devices such as mobile phones are increasingly used in people's daily lives. For example, mobile phones can be used to make mobile payments and play games. To enable common services (such as games, calls, and social software) to function properly, users' mobile phones are typically connected to wireless (radio) communications networks. However, in some scenarios, modern radio networks do not sufficiently meet the needs of such services (for example, the mobile phone signal becomes weak and of insufficient quality), which leads to delays in the operation of services and can degrade the user experience.

To solve the above problem, the electronic device can open the acceleration channel to meet the service needs. This accelerator channel may be an alternative network channel.

One embodiment of the present application provides a channel switching method for monitoring the network quality of each application stream currently running and switching, when the network quality for any stream becomes poor, that stream to an alternative network channel for transmission, thereby thereby increasing the quality of network operation for this flow. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, the first device, which is a mobile phone, is taken as an example. The application running on this mobile phone contains Stream A and Stream B. Both Stream A and Stream B are transmitted over the Wi-Fi channel first, and there is no stream transmitted over the cellular channel for this application. When the network quality for Stream B becomes poor, the mobile phone switches Stream B to the cellular channel. After switching, stream A is transmitted over the Wi-Fi channel, and stream B is transmitted over the cellular channel. The method improves network performance for a flow by switching a flow for which network performance has become poor to an alternative network channel, reduces service latency due to poor network performance for that flow, and improves the user experience.

One embodiment of the present application further proposes another method for switching channels. When an application has at least two streams carried on the same network channel, if the network quality for one of the streams becomes poor, multiple streams, including that stream, from the same network channel can be switched to an alternative network channel , so that the network performance result of one flow can be applied to multiple flows, including that one flow, and network channel switching can be implemented for multiple flows, thereby reducing the likelihood of service lag for the application in question and improving the user experience. In fig. 2 shows a simplified channel switching diagram for flows of the current application in one of the variants of this application. In fig. 2, we take thread A and thread B as an example, which are delay-sensitive threads for the application in question. These stream A and stream B are initially transmitted over the Wi-Fi channel. If the quality of Stream B is determined to be poor (e.g., the network latency status of Stream B is determined to be poor), Stream A and Stream B transmitted on the same Wi-Fi channel are switched to the cellular channel. so that the network performance result for stream B is applied to both stream A and stream B transmitted over the same network channel. Fast determination of network performance for flow B ensures rapid determination of network performance for all flows of the same type (eg, delay-sensitive flows) transmitted on the same network channel, and rapid switching of network channels.

One application typically uses multiple threads. Due to the different transmission characteristics of different streams, it is difficult to monitor whether the network performance of some streams has become poor. Therefore, even if an electronic device monitors the network performance of all flows of the application in question in real time, it is not possible to timely monitor all flows for which the network performance becomes poor. In the exemplary embodiment of the present application, when the network performance of one flow becomes poor, multiple flows including that flow on the same network channel are switched to an alternative network channel. This collection of multiple flows may contain a flow for which poor network quality monitoring cannot be performed in a timely manner. This allows us to solve the problem of delay in the service due to flows for which monitoring of poor network quality cannot be carried out in a timely manner. Still taking the above mentioned FIG. 2 as an example, stream A and stream B are transmitted over a Wi-Fi channel. If there is a problem with Wi-Fi transmission leading to poor network quality for stream A and stream B and delay in service operations of the application in question, but the mobile phone only monitors network quality degradation for stream B in a timely manner and cannot timely perform monitoring the quality of network operation for flow A, flow A and flow B are switched to an alternative network channel (for example, to a cellular communication channel), which solves the problem of delay in service operations caused by degradation of network quality for flow A, thereby reducing the delay of service operations and improving the experience for the user.

It should be noted that in the present embodiment, when a currently running application has n (n is a natural integer greater than 1) streams transmitted over the same network channel, if the network performance for one of these streams becomes poor, these n streams or all streams can be switched to an alternative network channel, which is not limited in the present embodiment.

Below we discuss in detail the implementation of another channel switching method proposed in the considered version of this application. It should be noted that in order to implement the above channel switching method proposed in the present embodiment, reference may be made to the following description, and the main difference is that during the stream switching operation, only the stream whose quality has become poor is switched.

An applicable scenario of another channel switching method proposed in the present embodiment is illustrated using FIG. 3a - fig. 3d.

The first device, a mobile phone, is taken as an example. In fig. Figure 3a shows a simplified image of a mobile phone desktop. As shown in FIG. 3a, the user can touch the video application icon on the desktop of the mobile phone to open the video application, causing an image to appear on the phone's display, a simplified version of which is shown in FIG. 3b.

In fig. 3c shows a simplified image of the result when the mobile phone uses the primary network channel (eg, Wi-Fi channel). As shown in FIG. 3c, after the mobile phone receives the primary network channel path, this primary network channel can be used to watch video.

It can be understood that a currently running network application (eg, the video application shown in FIG. 3c) may contain multiple streams (eg, video streams and audio streams), and these multiple streams may be transmitted over the primary network channel.

As shown in FIG. 2, if the quality of one stream (eg, a video stream) among multiple streams (eg, video streams and audio streams) becomes poor, the multiple streams are switched to an alternative network channel.

In fig. 3d shows a simplified image of a mobile phone using an alternative network channel (for example, a cellular communication channel). As shown in FIG. 3d, when a channel switch command is received, the mobile phone can switch voice streams and video streams from the current primary network channel to an alternate network channel, and can use this alternate network channel to watch video to avoid video freezing.

The channel switching method in the embodiments of the present application may be applied to said first device. This first device may be a mobile terminal, terminal device, User Equipment (UE), access terminal, subscriber unit, subscriber station, mobile station, mobile console, remote station, remote terminal, mobile device, user terminal, radio communication device , user agent or user hardware. The first device may be a station (ST) on a WLAN network, may be a cellular telephone, a cordless telephone, a session initiation protocol (SIP) telephone, a wireless local loop (WLL) station ), personal digital assistant (PDA), handheld device having a radio communication function, computer device, other processing device connected to a wireless modem, vehicle-mounted device, vehicle Internet terminal, computer, laptop computer , hand-held communications device, hand-held computer device, satellite wireless device, wireless modem card, Set Top Box (STB), Customer Premise Equipment (CPE), and/or other radio communication devices and in next generation communications systems, for example, a mobile terminal in a 5G communication network or a mobile terminal in a future public land mobile network (PLMN). The first device 10 may also be a wearable device. This wearable device may also be called a wearable smart device, and there is a collective name for wearable devices created by designing smart everyday items based on wearable technology, such as glasses, gloves, wristwatches, clothing and shoes. A wearable device is a portable device worn directly on the human body or integrated into the wearer's clothing or accessory. A wearable device is more than just a hardware device and can even implement very powerful functions with the right software support, data sharing and cloud connectivity. In a broad sense, smart wearable devices include, for example, smart wristwatches or smart glasses, which can be full-featured and large in size and can perform some or all functions without relying on a smartphone, as well as various smart headbands, bands and bracelets, or smart jewelry that focus on a specific type of application function and are intended to be used in conjunction with another device, such as a smartphone, and can monitor physical symptoms.

First, an example of an electronic device proposed in the next version of this application will be discussed below. In fig. 4 is a simplified block diagram of an electronic device 100. The electronic device 100 may be the first device described above.

Electronic device 100 may include processor 110, external storage interface 120B, internal storage 120A, universal serial bus (USB) interface 130, charging control module 140A, power management module 140B, battery 140C, antenna 1, antenna 2 , mobile communication module 150, radio module 160, audio module 170, loudspeaker 170A, telephone speaker 170B, microphone 170C, headset jack 170D, sensor module 180, button 190, motor 191, indicator 192, video camera 193, display screen 194 , subscriber identification module (SIM) card interface 195 and other similar components. The sensor module 180 may include a pressure sensor 180A, a gyro sensor 180B, a barometric pressure sensor 180C, a magnetic sensor 180D, an acceleration sensor 180E, a distance sensor 180F, an optical proximity sensor 180G, a fingerprint sensor 180H, a temperature sensor 180J, a touch sensor 180K, a sensor 180L ambient light, 180M bone conduction sensor and other similar sensors.

It will be understood that the simplified structure shown in the exemplary embodiment of the present application is not particularly limiting to the electronic device 100. In some other embodiments of the present application, the electronic device 100 may contain more or fewer components than shown in the drawing, or combine some components, either breaking up some components, or having different arrangements and connections of components. The components shown in the drawing may be implemented as hardware, software, or a combination of software and hardware.

Processor 110 may include one or more processor modules. For example, processor 110 may include an application processor (AP), a modem processor, a graphics processing unit (GPU), an image signal processor (ISP), a controller, a video codec, a digital signal processor processor, DSP), video processor and/or neural-network processing unit (NPU). The different processor modules may be independent units or may be integrated into one or more processors. The controller may be the nerve center or command center of the electronic device 100. The controller may generate an operation control signal based on the command operation code and the time sequence signal, and read a command and control execution of the command.

The storage device may be further configured in the processor 110 to store instructions and data. In some embodiments, the storage device in the processor 110 is a cache memory. This memory device may store instructions or data currently used or cyclically used by the processor 110. If the processor 110 needs to use such instructions or data again, the processor may directly recall the instructions or data from the memory device to avoid re-access operation and reduce time waiting for the processor 110 to improve system efficiency.

The channel switching method proposed in the embodiments of the present application may be implemented by the processor 110 by controlling or calling other components, for example, by calling a processor program for the embodiments of the present application stored in the internal memory 120A, to implement the channel switching operation for the user and improve the experience user.

In some embodiments, processor 110 may include one or more interfaces. Such interfaces can be an interface between integrated circuits (inter-integrated circuit, I2C), an audio interface between integrated circuits (inter-integrated circuit sound, I2S), an interface with pulse code modulation (PCM), an interface universal asynchronous transceiver (universal asynchronous receiver/transmitter, UART), mobile industry processor interface (MIPI), general-purpose input/output interface (GPIO), subscriber identification module interface module, SIM) and/or universal serial bus (USB) interface.

Such a USB interface 130 is an interface that satisfies the specifications of the USB standard, and may particularly be a mini-USB interface, a micro-USB interface, a USB Type C interface, or the like. The USB interface 130 may be configured to connect to a charger for the purpose of charging the battery of the electronic device 100, or may be used to transfer data between the electronic device 100 and a peripheral device, or may be configured to connect to a headset for the purpose of playing audio using it. headset. Alternatively, such an interface may be configured to connect to another electronic device, such as an augmented reality (AR) device.

It will be understood that the connections between modules via interfaces illustrated in a simplified manner in the present embodiment are merely exemplary for description and do not constitute a limitation on the structure of the electronic device 100. In some other embodiments of the present application, the electronic device 100 may alternatively use an interface connection method , different from what is set out in the above embodiment, or a combination of several interface connection methods.

The radio communication function in the electronic device 100 may be implemented by an antenna 1, an antenna 2, a mobile communication module 150, a radio communication module 160, a modem processor, a video processor, and other similar components.

Antenna 1 and Antenna 2 are configured to: transmit and receive electromagnetic wave signals. Each antenna in electronic device 100 may be used to cover one or more communication frequency bands. Different antennas can be further multiplexed to increase antenna utilization. For example, antenna 1 may be multiplexed as a diversity antenna in a radio local area network. In some other embodiments, the antenna may be used in combination with a tuning switch.

The mobile communication module 150 may provide a 2G/3G/4G/5G radio communication solution applied to the electronic device 100. The mobile communication module 150 may include at least one filter, switch, power amplifier, low noise amplifier , LNA) and other similar components. The mobile communication unit 150 may receive electromagnetic waves through the antenna 1, perform processing such as filtering and amplification on the received electromagnetic waves, and transmit the processed electromagnetic waves to the modem processor for demodulation. Mobile communication module 150 may further amplify the signal modulated by the modem processor and convert the signal into electromagnetic waves for radiation through antenna 1. In some embodiments, at least some functional modules from mobile communication module 150 may be located in processor 110. In some embodiments, , at least some functional modules from the mobile communication module 150 and at least some modules from the processor 110 may be located in the same device.

The modem processor may include a modulator and a demodulator. The modulator is configured to modulate a low frequency video signal to be transmitted and convert it into a medium and high frequency signal. The demodulator is configured to demodulate the received electromagnetic wave signal and convert it into a low frequency video signal. The demodulator then passes the demodulated low frequency video signal to the video processor for processing. The low frequency video signal is processed by the video processor and then transmitted to the application processor. The application processor outputs an audio signal through an audio device (which is not limited to speaker 170A, telephone speaker 170B, or the like) or presents an image or video on the display screen 194. In some embodiments, the modem processor may be an independent device. In some other embodiments, the modem processor may be independent of the processor 110, and the modem processor and the mobile communication module 150 or other functional module may be located in the same component.

The radio communication module 160 may provide a radio communication solution applicable to the electronic device 100, such as wireless local area networks (WLAN) communications (e.g., a wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) network), Bluetooth (BT), global navigation satellite system (GNSS), frequency modulation (FM), near field communication (NFC), and infrared (IR) technology communications. The radio communication module 160 may be one or more devices integrating at least one communication processor module. This radio communication module 160 receives electromagnetic waves using the antenna 2, performs frequency modulation and filter processing of the electromagnetic wave signal, and transmits the processed signal to the processor 110. The radio communication module 160 may alternatively receive the signal to be transmitted from the processor 110, perform frequency modulation and amplification of the signal to be transmitted signal and convert this signal into electromagnetic waves for radiation using antenna 2.

In some embodiments, in electronic device 100, antenna 1 is coupled to mobile communications module 150 and antenna 2 is coupled to radio communications module 160 so that electronic device 100 can communicate with a communications network and with another device using radio communications technology. This radio technology may be a global system for mobile communications (GSM), a general packet radio service (GPRS), a code division multiple access (CDMA), or a broadband wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA), synchronous time-division code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA), long term evolution system LTE), BT system, GNSS system, WLAN network, NFC communication, FM communication, IR technology and/or other similar technology. The GNSS system can be a global positioning system (GPS), a global navigation satellite system (GLONASS), a BeiDou satellite navigation system (BDS), a quasi-zenith satellite system (quasi -zenith satellite system, QZSS) and/or satellite based augmentation systems (SBAS).

The electronic device 100 implements a display function using a GPU, a display screen 194, an application processor, and other such components. The GPU is an image processing microprocessor coupled to a display screen 194 and an application processor. The GPU processor is configured to perform mathematical and geometric calculations and is configured to display graphics. Processor 110 may include one or more GPU processors and execute program instructions to generate or modify information presented on the display.

The display screen 194 is configured to present images, videos, and other such information. This display screen 194 includes a display panel. The display panel can be a liquid crystal display (LCD), organic light-emitting diode (OLED), active-matrix organic light emitting diode (AMOLED), flexible display flex light-emitting diode (FLED), mini-LED display, micro-LED display, micro-OLED display, quantum dot light emitting diode (QLED) display, or other similar panel. In some embodiments, electronic device 100 may include one or N display screens 194, where N is a positive integer greater than 1.

The electronic device 100 may perform the photography function using an ISP processor, a video camera 193, a video codec, a GPU processor, a display screen 194, an application processor, and other such components.

The ISP is configured to process data provided as feedback by the video camera 193. For example, the shutter is activated during photography. Light passes to the photosensitive element of the video camera through the lens, and the optical signal is converted into an electrical signal. The photosensitive element of the video camera transmits the electrical signal to the ISP for processing, and then the electrical signal is converted into an image visible to the naked eye. The ISP can also perform algorithmic optimization in terms of reducing image noise, improving brightness and skin tone. The ISP can also optimize scene photographing parameters such as exposure and color temperature. In some embodiments, the ISP may be located in the video camera 193.

The video camera 193 is configured to capture still images or video. The object is projected onto the photosensitive element through an optical image generated by the lens. The photosensitive element can be a charge coupled device (CCD) or a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) phototransistor. The photosensitive element converts the optical signal into an electrical signal and then transmits this electrical signal to the ISP processor so that the ISP processor converts the electrical signal into a digital image signal. The ISP transmits the digital image signal to the DSP for processing. The DSP processor converts the digital image signal into image signals in formats such as standard RGB and YUV formats. In some embodiments, electronic device 100 may include one or N video cameras 193, where N is a positive integer greater than 1.

A digital signal processor (DSP) is configured to process a digital signal and can also process another digital signal in addition to the digital image signal. For example, when the electronic device 100 performs frequency selection, the digital signal processor is configured to perform Fourier transform and other similar operations on the signal in the frequency domain.

A video codec is configured to compress (compress) or expand (decompress) digital video. Electronic device 100 may support one or more video codecs. With this approach, electronic device 100 can play or record video in multiple encoding formats, such as those developed by the moving picture experts group (MPEG) 1, MPEG 2, MPEG 3, and MPEG 4.

The NPU is a neural-network (NN) computational processor that quickly processes input information using a biological neural network structure, for example, by using the transmission mode between neurons in the human brain, and can then carry out continuous self-learning. The NPU may implement rational cognition applications in the electronic device 100, such as film state recognition, image restoration, image recognition, face recognition, speech recognition, and text understanding.

The external storage interface 120B may be configured to attach an external storage card, such as a micro SD card, to enhance the storage capabilities of the electronic device 100. The external storage card communicates with the processor 110 using the external storage interface 120B to implement a data storage function. , such as saving files such as music files or video files on an external memory card.

Internal storage device 120A may be configured to store computer-executable program code, where the executable program code contains instructions. This internal storage device 120A may include a program storage area and a data storage area. The program storage area may store an operating system, an application required by at least one function (eg, a sound reproduction function and an image reproduction function), and other such programs. The data storage area may store data (eg, audio data and address book) and other such data generated during use of the electronic device 100. In addition, the internal storage device 120A may include a high-speed random access memory, and may further include a non-volatile a storage device, such as at least one magnetic disk storage device, a flash memory device, or universal flash storage (UFS). The processor 110 executes instructions stored in the internal memory 120A and/or instructions stored in a memory located in the processor to carry out various functional applications and process data of the electronic device 100.

The electronic device 100 may perform an audio function using an audio module 170, a speaker 170A, a telephone speaker 170B, a microphone 170C, a headset jack 170D, an application processor, and other such components. This audio function is, for example, playing or recording music.

The 180K touch sensor is also called “touch panel (TP)”. This 180K touch sensor may be located on the display screen 194 to form a touch screen, also referred to as a touchscreen. The touch sensor 180K is configured to detect a touch operation performed on or adjacent to a surface of the touch sensor 180K. The touch sensor may transmit the detected touch operation to the application processor to determine the type of touch event. The touch sensor may provide a visual output regarding a touch operation using the display screen 194 . In some other embodiments, the touch sensor 180K may also alternatively be located on the surface of the electronic device 100 at a position other than the display screen 194.

In the exemplary embodiment of the present application, user input via the touch screen may be received through the touch sensor 180K, and the touch screen input may be transmitted to the processor 110 for processing.

Button 190 may be a power button, a volume button, or another similar button. The button 190 may be a mechanical button or may be a touch button. The electronic device 100 may receive key input and generate a key input signal, in accordance with user settings and control of functions of the electronic device 100.

The motor 191 may generate a vibration signal. This motor 191 may be configured to generate a vibration signal in response to an incoming call, and may be further configured to generate vibration feedback in response to touch. For example, touch operations performed in different applications (such as photography and audio playback) may correspond to different vibration feedback effects. For touch operations performed on different areas of the display screen 194, the motor 191 may also correspondingly generate different vibration feedback effects. Different application scenarios (such as time prompt, information reception, alarm clock and game) may also have different vibration feedback effects. The effect of vibration feedback in response to touch can be further specialized.

The indicator 192 may be an indicator light and may be configured to indicate charging status or a change in battery charge level, or may be further configured to indicate a message, missed call, alert, and other similar events.

The SIM card interface 195 is configured to connect to the SIM card. Such a SIM card may be inserted into or removed from the SIM card interface 195 to be brought into contact with or separated from the electronic device 100. Electronic device 100 may support one or N SIM card interfaces. Here, N is a positive integer greater than 1. The SIM card interface 195 may support a nano SIM card, a micro SIM card, a regular SIM card, or the like. Multiple cards can be inserted into the same SIM card interface 195 together. These several cards may be of the same type or may be of different types. The SIM card interface 195 is also compatible with different types of SIM cards. This 195 SIM card interface is also compatible with external memory cards. Electronic device 100 interfaces with a communications network using a SIM card to perform functions such as calling and data transfer. In some embodiments, electronic device 100 uses an eSIM card, in other words, an embedded SIM card. Such an eSIM card may be embedded in an electronic device 100 and cannot be separated from the electronic device 100.

Below is a diagram of the system architecture of the first device above. As shown in FIG. 5, the first device 10 contains an application layer 11, a service layer 12, a policy layer 13, and a kernel layer 14.

Application layer 11 can be used to provide a variety of network applications, and these network applications can be third party applications or system applications, such as network applications such as games, music and video. The types of network applications provided by application layer 11 are not limited in this application. A network application here refers to an application that requires a network link of the first device 10 to obtain resources from the communication network.

The service layer 12 may include an environment determination component 121, a network determination component 122, a link-level path control component 123, an application-level policy control component 124, and a link and application quality evaluation component 125. The environment determination component 121 may be configured to determine the state of the application. For example, a set of application states may include states such as exiting the application, opening the application, running the application, installing the application, and unloading the application. It may be understood that the listed states are only examples for description purposes, so that more states may exist. The details will again not be described here. Network determination component 122 may be configured to determine the open state of a network channel. The link-level path control component 123 may be configured to query/close a network link, detect a change in the state of a network link, update a network link selection policy, and store paths for multiple network links. The application-level policy management component 124 may generate various enforcement policies based on the input information. For example, the policy may focus on a function to speed up a network link, enable traffic measurement (eg, detect traffic on a network link), or other similar features. The link and application quality estimation component 125 may be configured to estimate the quality of the network link. The service layer 12 may further comprise: a network connection control component 126, configured to wake up a network channel, in other words, convert a network channel from a sleep state to an active, "awake" state in which the network channel can be immediately used.

The policy layer 13 may comprise a flow-level path control component 131, a flow-level policy control component 132, and a traffic measurement component 133. The flow-level path control component 131 may be configured to update the network link selection in accordance with a change in policy at the upper level, trigger a network link quality determination procedure, dynamically select the optimal link, and store paths for different network links, such as saving the network link path ( for example, the primary network link) currently used by the application, and the path of the alternate network link. Flow-level policy control component 132 may be configured to issue a network channel switching command, and may be further configured to store a network channel switching policy for flows in a network application. Traffic measurement component 133 may be configured to collect statistics on traffic reports and evaluate network performance for each flow.

Core layer 14 may include a component 141 for traffic reporting and a component 142 for policy execution. The traffic reporting component 141 may be configured to collect and transmit traffic information. Policy execution component 142 may be configured to switch network channels.

It may be understood that the interface connections between components illustrated in the exemplary embodiment of the present application are merely exemplary for purposes of description and are not limiting to the structure of the first device. In some other embodiments of the present application, the first device may alternatively use an interface connection method different from the above embodiment, or use a combination of several interface connection methods.

The system architecture shown in FIG. 5 is used only for the purpose of illustrating the implementation of the layered architecture of the first device. This system architecture shown in FIG. 5 may also be implemented as part of an existing multi-tier software architecture. Taking the Android system as an example, FIG. 6 shows a block diagram of the software structure of an electronic device based on the Android system according to one of the variants of this application. In a layered architecture, software is divided into several layers, and each layer has a clearly defined role and task. The levels communicate with one another through a software interface. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 6 in this application, the Android system is divided into five layers, including from top to bottom - the application layer, the application architecture layer (or also called the system architecture layer), the Android system library and operation layer, the hardware abstraction layer (HAL). ) and kernel level.

The application layer contains several application programs (hereinafter referred to as applications), such as video camera, gallery, calendar and WLAN. In one possible example, the application layer in the system architecture shown in FIG. 5, can match the device application layer. The electronic device application layer shown in FIG. 6 may include network applications described in embodiments of the present application, such as a video playback application and a gaming application.

The application architecture layer represents the Application Programming interface (API) and the application programming architecture at the application layer. The application architecture layer has some predefined functions. For example, the application architecture layer may contain a window manager, a content provider, a resource manager, a video camera service, and other similar functions. In one possible example, the service layer and policy layer in the system architecture shown in FIG. 5 can be located at the application architecture level.

The Android system library and runtime layer contains the Android system library and runtime. The system library may contain several functional modules, for example, a composite window manager, a 2D graphics program, a 3D graphics processor library (for example, OpenGL ES), a media library, and a font library.

The HAL is the interface layer between the operating system kernel and the hardware circuits. This HAL contains, but is not limited to, an Audio HAL and a Camera HAL.

The kernel layer is the layer between hardware and software. This kernel layer may contain a display driver, a video camera driver, an audio driver, a sensor driver, and other similar drivers. In one possible example, the kernel level in the system architecture shown in FIG. 5 may correspond to the kernel level in the software architecture shown in FIG. 6. In such a case, as shown in FIG. 6, the kernel layer may contain: a component for transmitting traffic messages and a component for executing policy.

The channel switching method according to the embodiments of the present application is discussed below by way of example with reference to the first device shown in FIG. 4 – fig. 6.

Fig. 7 is a simplified logic diagram of a channel switching method according to one embodiment of the present application. This method contains:

Step 301: Launching a network application in response to a user operation.

In particular, the user may perform an opening operation of the electronic device 100 to open a network application. For example, a user may touch an icon for a network application on the electronic device 100. In response to this user operation, the application layer 11 in the electronic device 100 launches the network application. It can be understood that the above example only illustrates the scenario of launching a network application by touching an icon and does not constitute a limitation on the variations of the present application. In some embodiments, the network application may alternatively be launched through other operations (eg, double-tapping or swiping). The network application may be a network-type application such as an online game, an online video player, or an online music player.

In fig. Figure 3a shows a simplified image of a mobile phone desktop. As shown in FIG. 3a, the user can touch the video application icon on the desktop of the mobile phone to open the video application, resulting in a simplified video display image as shown in FIG. 3b.

Step 302: The environment determination component 121 determines that the network application has switched to the foreground or a change has occurred in the network and reports this to the application level policy management component 124.

In particular, the environment determination component 121 at the service layer 12 in the electronic device 100 may continuously determine the status of a network application or network environment. When the environment determination component 121 detects that any network application has switched to the foreground or the network environment has changed, a first notification message may be sent to the application-level policy management component 124, where this first notification message may be used to notify the policy management component 124 at the application level that a network application has switched to the foreground or the network environment has changed. It may be understood that this first notification message may further comprise a network application identifier (eg, such network application identifier may be a UID), and this identifier may be used to uniquely identify the network application.

For example, a network application identifier could be implemented using the following code:

kuid_t sock_i_uid(struct sock *sk)

{ kuid_t uid

read_lock_bh(&sk->sk_callback_lock);

uid=sk->sk_socket?SOCK_INODE(sk->sk_socket)->i_uid: GLOBAL_ROOT_UID;

read_unlock_bh(&sk->sk_callback_lock);

return uid;

}

EXPORT_SYMBOL(sock_i_uid).

Step 303: The application-level policy control component 124 receives the first notification message sent by the environment determination component 121, and determines whether the currently running network application satisfies the conditions for enabling acceleration.

In particular, after the application-level policy control component 124 receives the first notification message sent by the environment determination component 121, it can be determined from the first notification message that the network application has switched to the foreground. The application-level policy management component 124 may further determine whether the network application is included in a predefined application whitelist.

In one particular embodiment, an application whitelist may be predefined in application-level policy management component 124, and the application whitelist may contain multiple network applications. Each network application can be identified by its own ID, and an application whitelist can be used to represent network applications that can be accelerated. Network applications in the predefined whitelist can contain indications of service types. For example, network applications in a predefined application whitelist may have sensitive service types, and these sensitive services may be latency-sensitive services, packet loss ratio-sensitive services, and other such services. By comparing the network application ID from the first notification message with the network application IDs from the predefined whitelist, it can be determined whether the network application from the first notification message is included in the predefined application whitelist. If the network application from the first notification message is included in the predefined application whitelist, it can be determined that this network application satisfies the conditions for enabling acceleration; and if the network application from the first notification message is not included in the predefined application whitelist, it can be determined that the network application does not satisfy the conditions for enabling acceleration.

For example, Table 1 presents a whitelist of network applications.

Table 1

Application Name Characteristic flow type Channel quality parameter Baidu network drive Download stream Data transfer rate WeChat Video stream Latency/Packet Loss A game Game stream Latency/Packet Loss

It can be understood that if the currently running network application is not included in the predefined application whitelist, in other words, the service type of the currently running network application is an insensitive service, the electronic device 100 can further determine other network channels with better quality when It is discovered that the quality of the primary network link has become poor, so that the insensitive service can be immediately switched to the found network links with better quality.

Step 304: The application-level policy control component 124 transmits a channel enable message to the flow-level path control component 131 to activate the network channel.

In particular, if the application-level policy control component 124 determines that a currently running network application satisfies the conditions for enabling acceleration, a channel activation message may be sent to the flow-level path control component 131, where the channel activation message is used to indicate that Flow-level path control component 131 may activate a network channel (eg, a primary network channel).

Step 305: The flow-level path control component 131 requests the path of the primary network link from the link-level path control component 123.

In particular, upon receiving the link enable message sent by the application-level policy control component 124, the flow-level path control component 131 may transmit a primary network channel request to the link-level path control component 123, where the primary network channel request is used to request the path of the primary network channel. network channel. For example, the primary network channel may be a primary Wi-Fi channel.

Step 306: The link-level path control component 123 transmits the path of the primary network link to the flow-level path control component 131.

In particular, the link-level path management component 123 may pre-configure the paths of multiple network links. For example, a collection of multiple network channels may comprise a primary Wi-Fi channel, a secondary Wi-Fi channel, a primary cellular channel, and a secondary cellular channel.

After the link-level path control component 123 receives the primary network channel request transmitted by the flow-level path control component 131, one network channel may be selected from the plurality of multiple network channels as the primary network channel (for example, the primary network channel represents is a primary Wi-Fi channel), and the path of this primary network channel may be passed to the flow-level path control component 131.

Step 307: Flow-level path management component 131 stores the received path of the primary network link.

Specifically, after the flow-level path control component 131 receives the primary network link path transmitted by the link-level path control component 123, the primary network link path may be stored. For example, the primary network link path could be represented by Wi-Fi link 1.

In fig. 3c shows a simplified view of the situation after the mobile phone uses the primary network channel. As shown in FIG. 3c, after the mobile phone receives the primary network channel path, the primary network channel can be used to watch video.

It can be understood that a currently running network application (eg, the video application in FIG. 3c) may contain multiple streams (eg, video streams and audio streams), and these multiple streams may be transmitted over the primary network channel.

Step 308: Application layer policy management component 124 transmits a traffic determination request to traffic measurement component 133.

In particular, the traffic sensing request may be used to instruct traffic measurement component 133 to begin calculating network application statistics on the primary network channel. Such a traffic determination request may contain an identifier (eg, a UID) of the network application whose traffic is currently being determined, and be used as a request to determine the flow characteristics of the network application corresponding to the UID on the primary network channel. It can be understood that the flow of this network application may be in the form of a packet.

It should be noted that this step 308 may be performed concurrently with step 304, or may be performed at any time after step 304, which is not limited in any way herein.

Step 309: The traffic measurement component 133 transmits a request to report traffic to the traffic reporting component 141.

In particular, upon receiving such a report traffic request sent by the application-level policy management component 124, the traffic measurement component 133 may transmit the report traffic request to the traffic reporting component 141, where this report traffic request may be used as a command for the traffic reporting component 141 to determine the network application packet on the current primary network channel and report that specific packet. It can be understood that the traffic definition request may include an identifier (eg, a UID) of the network application.

Step 310: The traffic reporting component 141 makes a traffic determination and reports this determined packet to the traffic measurement component 133.

Specifically, upon receiving the report traffic request sent by the traffic measurement component 133, the traffic reporting component 141 may determine a network application packet corresponding to the network application identifier (e.g., UID) specified in the report traffic request, so that it can receive a network application packet on the primary network channel, and the specific packet of this network application may be reported to the traffic measurement component 133.

In a specific implementation, the traffic reporting component 141 may call a component (eg, an Android system Netfilter component) to receive a network application packet on the primary network channel. It may be understood that the Netfilter component is mentioned herein by way of example only for description and is not limiting to the embodiments of the present application. In some embodiments, package determination may alternatively be performed by other components.

For example, network channel parameters could be implemented using the following code:

typedef struct{

bool available;

bool slowDevForbbiden;

uint64_t qoeBadTimeStamp;

uint64_t chQoeBadStartTime;

uint32_t rcvRate;

}

It can be understood that a particular packet may be a packet of one or more representative flows in a currently running network application, where the characteristic flow may represent the most sensitive flow in the network application in question, in other words, a flow that has a relatively large impact on the currently running current network application. In addition to this, the quality of a network channel can be assessed using the parameters of that network channel.

Step 311: The traffic measurement component 133 receives the packet reported by the traffic reporting component 141, analyzes the packet, obtains the packet analysis results, and passes the packet analysis results to the flow-level policy control component 132.

In particular, the packet in question may be any packet from each network application flow on the primary network channel. After receiving a network application packet determined by the traffic reporting component 141, the traffic measurement component 133 may analyze the packet and thereby obtain a packet analysis result. The above packet analysis can be performed to identify several characteristic flows based on the characteristics of the packet. These characteristic flows may be the most sensitive flows in a network application. For example, taking the game "Peace Elite" as an example, the characteristic thread of this game may be the voice thread, in other words, the voice thread has a relatively large impact on the game and has the highest sensitivity. When the quality of the voice stream is not good enough (for example, latency and packet loss ratio are not satisfactory), the user experience of the game suffers greatly. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the voice stream and then count the packets of the voice stream among the entire population of packets. In one particular implementation, packet analysis may be performed to calculate the packet loss rate and/or packet latency of a network application to determine the quality of a representative stream and then decide whether to switch the characteristic stream. For example, you can calculate the packet loss rate and/or packet delay within a given time period. If the calculated packet loss rate and/or delay meets the specified requirements, channel switching may not be necessary. If the calculated packet loss rate and/or delay do not meet the specified requirements, a channel switch may be performed for the representative flow in question.

In addition to this, voice stream packet identification can be realized using periodic control packet statistics. For example, taking UDP (User Datagram Protocol) as an example, the data packets feature for a voice stream can be represented as follows:

uplink: udp.payload[6]=0x64; And

downlink: udp.payload[6]=0x65.

In fig. Figure 8 shows a simplified diagram of a periodic control packet in a voice stream according to the UDP protocol.

In other words, by reading a predefined field in the payload of an uplink and downlink packet, it is possible to identify whether the packet in question is a voice stream packet.

If the collection of representative streams contains multiple streams (for example, voice streams and video streams), statistics can be determined based on the packet of any one of these representative streams (for example, a voice stream), thereby obtaining latency and/or packet loss ratio values based on voice stream packets. In one particular implementation, packets of a voice stream may be counted within a time span of a predetermined duration. Preferably, this preset duration may be 5 seconds, so that it can be determined as quickly as possible whether the quality of the voice stream has become poor, and then this voice stream can be switched as quickly as possible to an alternative network channel to achieve a better game experience. For example, if the delay value and/or packet loss ratio for a voice stream packet cannot meet the requirements, it may be determined that the quality of the voice stream is poor. In such a case, you can run a switch operation to switch the voice stream to an alternative network channel.

It should be noted that the above example uses the game for illustration purposes only. In a specific case, other network applications such as Baidu network drive can also be used. The characteristic stream for this network application is the download stream, in other words, the download stream packet can be found among the above set of packets, and the factor influencing the download stream packet can be the data transfer rate. In addition, the collection of network applications may further comprise social networking applications such as WeChat, and a typical stream for such a network application is a video stream. In other words, the video stream packet may be found among the above set of packets, and the influencing factor of the video stream packet may be latency and/or packet loss ratio.

It should be understood that in addition to the voice stream, the feature stream may further represent the actual game interaction stream within the game. Taking the game Peace Elite as an example, whether the current packet flow is a game interaction flow can be determined by periodically counting the number of UDP packets. Currently, the loop duration used by Peace Elite is 500ms. Therefore, whether a packet stream is a game thread can be determined by counting the total number of packets in the loop. For example, if the total number of packets in a 500ms loop is greater than 10, that packet stream is a game thread. In fig. Figure 9 shows a simplified scheme for counting packets in a game stream according to the protocol. As shown in FIG. 7, the horizontal axis represents time, and the vertical axis represents the total number of packets. Since the number of packets per second is generally maintained at 30, it can be determined by calculation that 15 packets occur every 500 ms, and therefore the packet stream can be defined as a game stream.

Now take the King of Glory game as an example, this King of Glory game uses the UDP filtering protocol number and packet header feature payload=0x00010000 to filter the game interaction packet. In fig. Figure 10 shows a simplified diagram of a periodic control packet for a game stream using the UDP protocol.

Step 312: Flow-level policy control component 132 determines that a switch should be made based on the result of the packet analysis and sends a request to obtain the alternate network link path.

In particular, after receiving the packet analysis result, the flow-level policy control component 132 may determine whether a switch should be performed. If flow-level policy control component 132 determines that a switch should be made, an alternate network path path may be requested.

For example, the alternative network link path request mentioned above could be implemented with the following code:

private boolean requestNetwork(){

Log.i(TAG, "requestNetwork, pathId="+mChannelId+"slotId="+mSlotId+"mSubId")

If(mConnectivityManager==NULL{

Log.e(TAG, "requestNetwork, mConnectivityManager is NULL");

return false;

}

If(!Utils.isValidSubId(mSubId)){

Log.e(TAG, "requestNetwork, invalid subId: "+mSubId);

return false;

}

NetworkRequest.Builder builder=new NetworkRequest.Builder();

builder.addCapability(NetworkCapabilities. NET_CAPABILITY_INTERNET);

builder.addTransportType(NetworkCapabilities. Transport_CELLULAR);

builder.remove Capability(NetworkCapabilities.NET_CAPABILITY_NOT_RESTRICTED);

builder.setNetworkSpecifier(String.valueOf(mSubId));

NetworkRequest build=builder.build();

mConnectivityManager.requestNetwork(build, this, (int)GET_PATH_RESPONSE_TIMER_MS);

return true;

}

In addition, in one particular implementation, the path of the network link (for example, this path may be represented by the device number on the network card or SIM card) may be defined in the data structure, and the example code may be as follows:

struct sock{

struct sock_common _sk_common

#define sk_node _sk_common.skc node

#define sk_nulls_node _sk_common.skc_nulls_node

#define sk_refcnt _sk_common.skc_crefcnt

#define sk_tx_queue_mapping _sk_common.skc_tx_queue_mapping

#define sk_dontcopy_begin _sk_common.skc_dontcopy_begin

#define sk_dontcopy_end _sk_common.skc_dontcopy_end

#define sk_hash _sk_common.skc_hash

#define sk_portpair _sk_common.skc_portpair

#define sk_num _sk_common.skc_num

#define sk_dport _sk_common.skc_dport

#define sk_addrpair _sk_common.skc_addrpair

#define sk_daddr _sk_common.skc_daddr

#define sk_rcv_saddr _sk_common.skc_saddr

#define sk_family _sk_common.skc_family

#define sk_state sk_common.skc_state

#define sk_reuse _sk_common.skc_reuse

#define sk_reuseport _sk_common.skc_reuseport

#define sk_ipv6only _sk_common.skc_ipv6only

#define sk_net_refcnt _sk_common.skc_net_refcnt

#define sk_bound_dev_if _sk_common.skc_ bound_dev_if

#define sk_bind_node _sk_common.skc_bind_node

#define sk_prot _sk_common.skc_prot

#define sk_net _sk_common.skc_net

#define sk_v6_daddr _sk_common.skc_v6_daddr

#define sk_v6_rcv_saddr _sk_common.skc_v6_rcv_saddr

#define sk_cookie _sk_common.skc_cookie

#define sk_incoming_cpu _sk_common.skc_incoming_cpu

#define sk_flags _sk_common.skc_net_flags

#define sk_rxhash _sk_common.skc_rxhash

#ifdef CONFIG_HW_DPIMARK_MODULE

#define sk_hwdpi_mark _sk_common.skc_ hwdpi_mark

}

As the code shows, sk_bound_dev_if represents the device number for the target NIC or target SIM card to be switched. It can be understood that the packet can be received through a network card or SIM card, and the code for receiving the packet can follow the following example:

Pktinfo.msg.flow_msg.dev_if=sk->sk_bound_dev_if, where

pktinfo – received packet and msg.flow_msg – name of the packet flow.

In one specific implementation, the method for requesting an alternative network channel path may be such that the flow-level policy control component 132 passes the alternative network channel request to the flow-level path control component 131 to request the alternative network channel. Upon receiving an alternative network channel request, the flow-level path control component 131 may forward the alternative network channel request to the link-level path control component 123. Upon receiving this alternative network channel request, the link layer path control component 123 may pass the link status request to the network determination component 122, where the link status request may be used to query to obtain the activation status of each optional network link. It can be understood that the activation status may be an available status or an unavailable status. The availability status can be used to indicate that the optional network channel in question can be activated. This optional network channel may be a secondary Wi-Fi channel, a primary cellular channel, a secondary cellular channel, or another similar channel.

After receiving the link status request sent by the link-level path control component 123, the network determination component 122 can determine the activation status of each of the network link options. In one particular embodiment, network determination component 122 may be configured to control switching of each of the option network channels. When any optional network channel is activated, that optional network channel is in an available state; and when any optional network channel is not activated, that optional network channel is in an unavailable state. Therefore, after determining the activation statuses for all of the option network channels requested by the link-level path control component 123, the network determination component 122 may transmit these activation statuses for all of the option network channels to the link-level path control component 123.

After receiving the activation statuses for the network channel options, the link-level path control component 123 may select an available network channel (in other words, being an option network channel in the available state), and may further transmit a channel evaluation request to the channel and application quality evaluation component 125. where a link estimation request can be used to request an assessment of the quality of available network links.

After receiving the channel estimation request transmitted by the link layer path control component 123, the channel and application quality estimation component 125 can estimate the quality of each available network channel in accordance with the channel estimation request. For example, link quality metrics may include latency, packet loss rate, bandwidth, and link data rate. The estimation procedure may involve determining the round-trip time (RTT) of the available network links, and the network link with the shortest round-trip time is the best. Optionally, when an available network channel has a selection history record, in other words, the available network channel has already been previously selected as a network channel, then the quality of the channel can be assessed based on a combination of the RTT time and the history records. These history records may contain historical reception speed, the past number of times the channel quality was poor, and other similar information. The method for assessing channel quality is not particularly limited in the embodiments of the present application. After the link and application quality evaluation component 125 completes evaluating the quality of all available network channels according to the channel evaluation request, the evaluation results may be transmitted to the link-level path control component 123 .

After receiving the evaluation results, the link-level path control component 123 may select the best available network channel as an alternative network channel based on these evaluation results, and may transmit the path of the alternative network channel to the flow-level path control component 131.

Upon receiving the alternate network link path transmitted by the link-level path control component 123, the flow-level path control component 131 may transmit a switch alert, where the switch alert includes the path of the alternate network link.

The selection of an alternative network channel is described using a mobile phone as an example and with reference to FIGS. 11a - fig. 11c. As shown in FIG. 11a, the mobile phone is capable of operating in four network channels, including a primary Wi-Fi channel (for example, Wi-Fi 1), a secondary Wi-Fi channel (for example, Wi-Fi 2), a primary cellular channel (for example, Mobile 1) and a secondary cellular channel (for example, Mobile 2). Suppose that the mobile phone is currently running a network application (for example, WeChat) on Wi-Fi channel 1 (primary network channel), and this network application contains a feature stream A (for example, a video stream), a feature stream B (for example, audio stream) and non-characteristic stream C. When the mobile phone determines that the quality of characteristic stream A has become poor and determines that a switch should be made, an alternative network channel may be determined, where this alternative network channel may be the best quality channel from the secondary Wi-Fi channel (for example, Wi-Fi 2), primary cellular channel (for example, Mobile 1), and secondary cellular channel (for example, Mobile 2). After selecting one network channel from the combination of a secondary Wi-Fi channel (e.g., Wi-Fi 2), a primary cellular channel (e.g., Mobile 1), and a secondary cellular channel (e.g., Mobile 2) as an alternative network channel (e.g., Mobile 1) channel can be switched. Next, both the feature stream A and the feature stream B can be switched to an alternative network channel, in other words, to the Mobile 1 channel. As shown in FIG. 11b, in such a case, non-characteristic channel C may continue to be transmitted on the primary network channel, in other words, the Wi-Fi channel, and the characteristic stream and A characteristic stream B may be transmitted on the alternative network channel, in other words, the Mobile 1 channel.

Optionally, when a mobile phone analyzes a packet and finds that the quality of feature stream A is no longer satisfactory, feature stream A, feature stream B, and non-signature stream C may be switched to the selected alternative network channel, in other words, to Mobile 1 channel. .As shown in Fig. 11c, in this case, all the streams feature stream A, feature stream B and non-feature stream C are transmitted on the Mobile 1 channel.

Step 313: The flow-level path control component 131 transmits the path of the alternative network link to the flow-level policy control component 132.

Step 314: The flow-level policy control component 132 transmits a channel switch command to the policy execution component 142.

In particular, upon receiving the alternate network link path transmitted by the flow-level path control component 131, the flow-level policy control component 132 may issue a link switch command to the policy execution component 142, where the link switch command may be used to instruct component 142 to execution policy that several representative flows should be switched from the current primary network channel to an alternative network channel, so that the channel switching operation can be completed faster, the delay caused by channel switching can be reduced, and the user experience can be improved.

Step 315: Policy execution component 142 performs channel switching.

In particular, upon receiving a channel switch command sent by the flow-level policy control component 132, the policy execution component 142 may switch multiple representative threads from the current primary network channel to an alternate network channel. In other words, other threads of the network application in question can continue to transmit and operate on the primary network channel, and a few representative threads can transmit and operate on the alternate network channel, so that the switchover can be completed quickly, thereby ensuring quality of service and a good user experience.

The channel switching method according to embodiments of the present application will be discussed in detail below with reference to the system architecture diagram for the first device shown in FIG. 5, and the interaction flow diagrams between the components of the first device shown in FIG. 12 – fig. 14b.

In fig. 12 shows a diagram of the sequence of operations of interaction between the components of the first device according to one embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 12, the method may contain:

Step 1201: Launching a network application in response to a user operation.

To implement this step, references may be made to step 301, so the details will not be described again here.

Step 1202: The network application exchanges streams with the server.

The user selects a service from a network application, and the network application transmits the stream required by that service to the server according to the characteristics of the service. A network application can use a network channel (eg, a primary network channel) to transmit a stream to a server. In one example, when the network application is a video application and the user selects to play a video, the stream required by the service may comprise a video stream and an audio stream such that the video stream and audio stream can be transmitted over the primary network channel. Accordingly, the mobile phone can use the primary network channel to communicate with the server, receive the video stream and audio stream from the server, and play the video.

It should be noted that the subject embodiment of the present application focuses on how to implement a network channel switch after a network application begins to use the primary network channel to communicate with the server, and how to use the primary network channel to begin communicating with the server after the network application is initially launched in the considered version of this application is not limited.

Step 1203: The environment determination component 121 determines that the network application has switched to the foreground and notifies the application level policy control component 124.

To carry out this step, reference may be made to the description of step 302, so the details will not be described again here.

Step 1204: Application-level policy control component 124 determines whether the network application meets the conditions to enable acceleration.

To carry out this step, reference may be made to the description of step 303, so the details will not be described again here.

Next, we will consider the implementation of a white list of network applications.

In the exemplary embodiment of the present application, an example is taken in which network application data is divided into streams according to data types such that one type corresponds to one network application stream. As shown in Table 2 below, in addition to network applications that need acceleration, the network application whitelist may further contain:

the target flow type that needs to be monitored in each network application, such as the target flow type field shown in Table 2;

a thread model corresponding to the type of each target thread, such as the thread model field shown in Table 2 below;

a network quality evaluation parameter used in evaluating the network quality of the target flow, for example, as the link quality parameter field shown in Table 2; And

a policy for implementing channel switching for a network application flow after the evaluation shows that the network performance of the target flow has become poor, which is called a flow switching policy, such as the flow switching policy field shown in Table 2 below.

table 2

Application Name Target stream type Characteristic flow model Channel quality parameter Thread switching policy Baidu network drive Video download stream Four 1 Data transfer rate Downloading a video stream, downloading a voice stream WeChat Video stream Four 2 Latency/Packet Loss Video stream, voice stream A game Game interaction flow Four 3 Latency/Packet Loss Game interaction stream, voice stream

Optionally, the target stream may be a stream that may be quickly affected by one or more network quality metrics when the quality of the network link carrying the target stream becomes poor, for example, one or more representative network application streams .

Optionally, the network performance evaluation parameter for the target flow may be a parameter that can quickly indicate that the network performance for the target flow has become poor.

The stream switching policy records the stream whose network channel needs to be switched along with the target stream. As an option, the stream recorded in the stream switching policy is, in general, a stream that has a relatively large impact on the processing of a service in a network application, such as the typical network application streams in the above description, video streams and audio streams in video playback applications and game streams and voice streams in gaming applications.

Optionally, a flow that is recorded in the flow switching policy and whose network channel is to be switched along with the target flow may be a flow that is sensitive to the same network estimation parameter as the target flow. For example, if the target thread is a delay-sensitive thread, the threads in the thread switching policy are some or all of the delay-sensitive threads, including the target thread in the network application. If the target flow is a packet loss ratio sensitive flow, the flows in the flow switching policy are some or all of the packet loss ratio sensitive flows, including the target flow in the network application. Therefore, when the network performance for the target flow becomes poor, the network channel is switched for the flow type sensitive to the same network evaluation parameter in the network application.

Optionally, a flow model corresponding to the target flow type is configured to record information about packet attributes that need to be monitored in the target flow. For example, the feature information may be at least one of the following information: a packet quan or quintet, a protocol number, a line in the payload, and other similar information.

It should be noted that in the stream switching policy in embodiments of the present application, when the quality of a particular network application stream becomes poor, a network channel switch may be implemented for multiple network application streams, including a stream on the same network channel, so that the multiple streams are switched from the current network channel to other network channels with relatively better quality to avoid latency of network application services. For example, in Table 2, if the video stream of the WeChat application becomes bad, and the video stream and the voice stream of this WeChat application are in the same network channel, switch the network channel for both the video stream and the voice stream of the WeChat application to move these video stream and voice stream from the current network channel to a network channel with relatively better quality, thereby reducing the likelihood of lag when playing video and voice in the WeChat application.

Step 1205: The application-level policy control component 124 transmits an acceleration enable message to the thread-level path control component 131.

Specifically, if the application-level policy control component 124 determines that a currently running network application satisfies the conditions for enabling acceleration, an acceleration service for that running application may be activated and an acceleration-enable message is sent to the flow-level path control component 131, where this acceleration enable message is used to indicate that the flow-level path control component 131 can activate the acceleration service for the network application in question.

The acceleration service may contain, but is not limited to:

activating the alternate network channel when the environment in which the electronic device is located or the system environment of the electronic device changes such that the alternate network channel transitions from a dormant state to an active, “awake” state; and/or

monitoring the network quality of multiple network application streams, and switching, when the electronic device during monitoring determines that the quality of the network application streams has become poor, the aggregate of multiple network application streams containing the degraded stream to an alternative network channel, such that the aggregate of multiple Network application streams are always transmitted over network links with relatively good quality, which ensures the quality of stream transmission, reduces the likelihood of network application services being late, and improves the user experience. It should be noted that if the electronic device has activated an alternative network channel, then when a decision is made to switch the multiple streams to the alternative network channel, the multiple streams are switched to the activated network channel. If the electronic device has not activated the alternate network channel when the decision is made to switch multiple streams to the alternate network channel, the electronic device must first activate the alternate network channel and then switch to the activated alternate network channel.

Optionally, the acceleration enable message may contain information corresponding to the identifier of a currently running network application in the network application whitelist, e.g., the identifier of the currently running network application, the type of the target stream, the flow model corresponding to the type of the target stream, information about parameters for assessing the quality of network operation and information about the flow switching policy. For details, reference may be made to the above related description, so the details will not be described here again.

Optionally, flow-level path management component 131 may store the path of a currently used network channel, where the path is also the path of a network channel used by the network application. Alternatively, if the path of the network channel currently used is not stored in the flow-level path control component 131, in other words, the path of the network channel used by the network application is not stored in the flow-level path control component 131, the path control component 131 The flow-level path control component 123 can query the link-level path control component 123 for information about the path of a network link used by the network application, and the link-level path control component 123 can pass the path of the network link used by the network application to the flow-level path control component 131 .

Step 1206: The flow-level path control component 131 transmits the network application identifier and flow switching policy information to the flow-level policy control component 132 and transmits a traffic determination request to the traffic measurement component 133, and the traffic measurement component 133 transmits a request to report the traffic to the transmission component. traffic messages.

Optionally, the traffic definition request may contain a first configuration file for the network application, and the first configuration file may contain: an identifier of the network application, an indication of the target flow type, an indication of the flow model corresponding to that target flow type, and performance evaluation parameter information networks.

Optionally, the traffic report request may contain a second configuration file for the network application in question, and this second configuration file may contain: an identifier of the network application, an indication of the target flow type, and an indication of the flow model corresponding to that target flow type.

It should be noted that the purpose of the present step is to initialize various relevant information regarding the currently running network application for the flow-level policy control component 132, the traffic measurement component 133, and the traffic reporting component 141. Therefore, in other possible implementations, the flow-level path control component 131 may alternatively directly pass the second configuration file for the network application in question to the traffic reporting component 141, which is not limited in any way.

As a result of this step, the traffic reporting component can begin monitoring the flows of the network application in question and the subsequent network channel switching procedure for the flow can then be initiated.

The procedure for activating an alternative network channel by an electronic device and the procedure for switching channels for streams are described below with reference to FIGS. 13, and fig. 14a and fig. 14b respectively.

In fig. 13 shows another diagram of the sequence of operations of interaction between the components of the first device according to one embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 13, the method may contain:

Step 1301: The environment determination component 121 determines the environment.

In particular, the environment defined by the environment definition component may be a physical environment where the first device is located, or may be a system environment in the first device. For example, the physical environment may contain elevators, high-speed trains, parking garages, and other scenes with poor communication network quality; and the system environment can be characterized by: device temperature and other similar parameters.

Taking the elevator scene as an example, when the user enters the elevator, the rise or fall of the elevator causes a change in the force of gravity acting on the user. For example, raising an elevator causes weight to increase, and lowering an elevator causes weight to decrease. Therefore, the environment can be determined using an acceleration sensor in the first device. When the acceleration sensor determines that the user's weight has decreased or increased, in other words, determines the acceleration of the first device in the vertical direction, it can be determined that the user is in an elevator environment.

In addition, since the elevator stops according to the needs of different users (for example, different users may press buttons of different floors) while the elevator is ascending or descending, the elevator may continue to move in the vertical direction, or may stop and then move again. Since the first device does not detect movement in the horizontal direction during the raising or lowering of the elevator, it is still possible to determine that the first device is located in the elevator, where movement in the horizontal direction can be detected by an acceleration sensor in the first device. For example, if the acceleration sensor detects acceleration in the horizontal direction, it can be determined that motion in the horizontal direction is occurring.

When the first device determines that it is experiencing acceleration in the horizontal direction, in other words, when the first device is moving horizontally, it may be determined that the user has exited the elevator. In other words, the first device left the elevator. In such a case, there is no need to determine the alternative network channel in advance, and there is no need to transmit a scene change notification message to the application-level policy control component 124, thereby reducing the power consumption of the electronic device by the amount associated with determining the alternative network channel.

Optionally, the electronic device may alternatively determine whether the scene where the user is located has changed by measuring the signal strength of the mobile network. For example, when the mobile network signal strength becomes weak, it can be determined that the user has entered an environment with poor communication network quality. In such a case, the first device may determine that the scene has changed and may transmit a scene change notification message to the application layer policy management component 124, where the packet is used to determine an alternative network channel in advance. When the signal strength of the mobile network becomes stronger, it can be determined that the user has entered an environment with better quality of the communication network. In such a case, there is no need to determine the alternative network channel in advance and there is no need to transmit a scenario change notification message to the application-level policy management component 124, thereby reducing the power consumption of the electronic device by the amount associated with determining the alternative network channel.

Step 1302: The environment determination component 121 transmits an environment change notification message to the application level policy management component 124.

In particular, if the environment determination component 121 detects that the environment of the first device has changed (for example, a user has entered an elevator), an environment change notification message may be sent to the application layer policy control component 124, where the environment change notification message is used to notify application-level policy management component 124 that the user's environment has changed, so that application-level policy management component 124 can be launched to perform subsequent data processing.

Step 1303: The application-level policy control component 124 forwards an environment change notification message to the flow-level path control component 131 .

Step 1304: The flow-level path control component 131 requests an alternative network channel from the link-level path control component 123.

In particular, since the signal in an elevator is generally poor, selecting, activating, and switching a network channel after entering the elevator typically causes a large service delay, resulting in a poor experience for the user. Therefore, when it is determined that the user has entered the elevator, an alternative network channel can be preselected, which speeds up channel switching and reduces the service delay caused by channel switching.

Step 1305: The link layer path control component 123 receives the specified alternative network link request, and requests the activation status of each of the option network links.

In particular, upon receiving an alternative network channel request sent by flow-level path control component 131, link-level path control component 123 may transmit a channel status request to network determination component 122, where this channel status request may be used to request acquisition of an activation status. each of the network channel options. It can be understood that the activation status may indicate an available state and an unavailable state. The available state can be used to indicate that an optional network channel can be activated, and the unavailable state can be used to indicate that activation of that optional network channel is prohibited. This optional network channel may be a secondary Wi-Fi channel, a primary cellular channel, a secondary cellular channel, or another similar channel.

Step 1306: The network determination component 122 determines the activation status of each of the option network channels, and transmits the activation status of each of the option network channels to the path control component 123 at the link level.

In particular, after receiving the channel status transmitted by the link-level path control component 123, the network determination component 122 can determine the activation status of each of the network channel options. In one particular embodiment, network determination component 122 may be configured to control switching of each of the option network channels. When any optional network channel is activated, that optional network channel is in an available state; and when any optional network channel is not activated, that optional network channel is in an unavailable state. Therefore, after determining the activation statuses of all of the option network channels requested by the link-level path control component 123, the network determination component 122 may transmit these activation statuses of all of the option network channels to the link-level path control component 123.

Step 1307: Link layer path control component 123 queries the quality of each of the available network links.

In particular, upon receiving the activation statuses of the network channel options, the path control component 123 at the link level may select one of the available network channels (in other words, the option network channel being in the available state), and may further transmit a channel evaluation request to the evaluation component 125 link quality and application where this link estimation request can be used to request an estimate of the quality of available network links.

Step 1308: The link and application quality evaluation component 125 evaluates the quality of each of the available network links and transmits the evaluation result to the link-level path control component 123.

In particular, after receiving the channel estimation request transmitted by the link layer path control component 123, the channel and application quality estimation component 125 can estimate the quality of each of the available network channels in accordance with the channel estimation request.

For example, the quality of a network link may be assessed in accordance with at least one of the network link parameters: latency, packet loss rate, bandwidth, and/or link data rate. For example, a quality assessment can be performed to estimate the round-trip time (RTT) for available network links, such that the network link with the shortest round-trip time is the best.

Optionally, when any available network channel has a recorded selection history, in other words, this available network channel has already been previously selected as a network channel, then the quality of that channel can be assessed based on the combination of the RTT time and the recorded history. The recorded history may include a history of the data rate of the received information, a history of the number of times the channel quality was poor, and other similar information. The method for assessing channel quality in the embodiments of the present application is not particularly limited.

After the link and application quality evaluation component 125 completes assessing the quality of all available network channels at the link estimation request, the evaluation result may be transmitted to the link-level path control component 123 .

Step 1309: Link-level path control component 123 determines an alternative network link based on the evaluation result.

Specifically, after receiving the evaluation result, the link-level path control component 123 may select the best available network channel as an alternative network channel based on the evaluation result.

Step 1310: The link layer path control component 123 requests the network connection control component 126 to activate an alternative network link.

Step 1311: The network connection control component 126 activates the alternative network channel, and feedbacks a notification message that the alternative network channel is activated to the path control component 123 at the link level.

The network connection control component 126 activates the alternate network channel in response to a request from the path control component 123 at the link level, where the activation of the alternative network channel means the activation of the transition of the alternative network channel from a sleep state to an active, "awake" state to quickly switch from the current network channel to an alternative network channel when a network channel switch is then required.

It should be understood that only a scene change is determined in step 1301, in other words, a change in the current scene may make the network performance poor, which may also cause services to lag. However, the switching conditions are not satisfied. In such a case, the electronic device does not switch to an alternate network channel, in other words, the electronic device still uses the original network channel to carry network application streams.

Step 1312: The link-level path control component 123 transmits the path of the alternative network link to the flow-level path control component 131.

Therefore, the flow-level path control component 131 can receive and store the alternate network link path transmitted by the link-level path control component 123.

Through the above procedure, the electronic device can activate an alternative network channel after detecting a change in the environment, so that when it is subsequently determined that the network channel should be switched, switching the network channel can be performed quickly, and the likelihood of network application services being delayed can be reduced.

In fig. 14a and fig. 14b shows another flow diagram of interactions between components in a first device according to an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 14a and fig. 14b, the method may comprise:

Step 1401: The traffic reporting component 141 performs traffic determination and reports the received packet to the traffic measurement component 133.

Specifically, based on the above step 1206, after receiving the traffic report request, the traffic reporting component 141 can determine and receive a packet from the target flow of the network application in accordance with the traffic report request, and reports the determination result to the traffic measurement component 133 . The above determination result may contain: a packet of the target flow, or a packet of the target flow and statistical information about the packets of the target flow, etc.

In one particular implementation, the traffic reporting component 141 may call a component (eg, an Android system Netfilter component) to obtain a packet from a target network application flow on a current network channel (eg, a primary network channel). It may be understood that the Netfilter component is only an example for description and is not limiting to the embodiments of the present application. In some embodiments, package determination may alternatively be performed by other components.

For example, network channel parameters can be implemented with the following code:

typedef struct{

bool available;

bool slowDevForbbiden;

uint64_t qoeBadTimeStamp;

uint64_t chQoeBadStartTime;

uint32_t rcvRate;

}

It can be understood that the packet accepted for determination may be a packet of one or more representative flows in a currently running network application, where that characteristic flow may be the most sensitive flow in the network application, in other words, a flow having a relatively large impact on the running currently a network application. In addition to this, the quality of a network channel can be assessed using the parameters of that network channel.

As an option, when the traffic reporting component 141 performs traffic detection, a hook function can be registered in the Netfilter core architecture to obtain the target flow packet. A general block diagram of the implementation is shown in FIG. 15. The Netfilter component forwards the packet to the component's nf_hook function to report traffic. This packet, transmitted over the current network link, then enters component 141 for transmitting traffic messages. This traffic reporting component performs procedures such as packet analysis, flow table creation, and packet content analysis, and stores that target flow packet in the SKB queue. For a packet in the SKB queue, in accordance with the reporting policy of the target flow to which the packet in question belongs, data that needs to be reported regularly (packet or packet and statistical information) is collected by a timer command and reported to the traffic measurement component 133, and the packet that must be reported immediately, traffic measurement component 133 is reported via the NetLink flow.

It should be noted that there may be one or more target threads; and when the traffic reporting component determines packets of the target flow, all or some of the packets of the target flow may be reported to the traffic measurement component, which is not limited in the present embodiment.

Taking the determination (reception) and messages of a periodic control packet flow from a target flow as an example, a specific implementation procedure of a component for transmitting packet messages is described with reference to FIG. 15.

A periodic control packet in this embodiment may be a packet appearing in the target stream at specific time intervals. For example, such a periodic control packet may be a packet in which fixed attribute information is present at a fixed payload position among packets of the target flow. The time interval between periodic control packets in the considered version of this application is not limited, and is, for example, 1 s. In fig. 16a shows a simplified diagram of the flow of periodic control packets with an interval of 1 s. Accordingly, the traffic measurement component 133 may calculate the round trip time according to the periodic control packet flow and use this round trip time as a parameter for estimating the network performance of a target flow to determine the network performance of the target flow. .

The round-trip time (RTT) mentioned above is an important indicator of the performance of the communication network, representing the total delay time from the moment when the transmitter transmitted data until the moment that the transmitter received an acknowledgment receipt from the receiver (receiver sends a confirmation receipt immediately after receiving the data). In fig. 16b is a simplified diagram of a method for calculating round trip time for a stream of periodic control packets. In the diagram in Fig. 16b, a stream of periodic control packets transmitted between the user's mobile phone and the server is taken as an example. The round-trip time for a periodic heartbeat stream is the total latency from the time the user's mobile phone begins transmitting a request heartbeat to the server until the user's mobile receives the response heartbeat returned by the server.

For example, the stream of periodic control packets proposed in the present embodiment may have the following characteristics: (ip.src==100.100.3.90 && udp.srcport==60539 && ip.dst==58.217.244.144 && udp.dstport== 10126) && (data[6]==64). Here, ip.src represents the source ip, udp.srcport represents the source port number, ip.dst represents the destination ip, udp.dstport represents the destination port number, and data[6] represents the six bytes of the packet payload. Further, these source ip, destination ip, source port number and destination port number represent the four parameters of the periodic control packet flow.

According to FIG. 15, a specific component implementation procedure for package messages may include:

Stage S1: Initialization.

When a network application is launched and loaded, the traffic messaging component 141 receives an app launch message and registers the nf_hook function. Code examples are shown in Fig. 17a and fig. 17b.

Stage S2: Packet processing.

This stage further contains three stages of packet parsing, flow table lookup, and packet parsing. The flow table records flow identification information in each network application and statistical information for each flow. This statistical information for each stream may include: the number of packets in the received stream, the total number of bytes of packets in the received stream, the number of error packets, and other similar data. The data flow identity may be calculated according to the quadruple or quintuple parameters of the packets in the stream, and the above calculations may particularly use a hashing algorithm so that the data flow identity may be a hash value calculated for the quadruple or quintuple parameters packages.

During packet parsing, traffic reporting component 141 receives the packet and can parse to determine whether the UID of the network application in question is present in the packet. If the UID is present, it means that the packet in question is a packet from the network application in question, and then the four (or five) packet parameters are parsed and the flow table is populated. If the UID is missing, this indicates that the packet is not that of the network application in question, and the procedure ends.

The above four parameters may contain: source IP address, destination (destination) IP address, source port and destination port. The five parameters may contain: source IP address, destination (destination) IP address, source port, destination port and protocol number.

By looking up the flow table, the data flow identification information can be calculated according to the quartet (or quintuplet) of packet parameters. The calculated identification information can be used to find whether this identification information has already been recorded in the flow table, and if so, update statistical information corresponding to this identification information in the flow table. If not, a flow node is created in the flow table according to this data flow identification information, and the current statistical information about the flow is entered into this flow node.

During packet analysis, traffic reporting component 141 may filter the received packet using a predefined flow model to obtain all or some of the target flow's packets. For example, if the above flow model corresponding to a heartbeat flow is used, a heartbeat flow for a target flow can be obtained.

The above flow model may be configured in the traffic reporting component through a configuration file, and this configuration file may be passed in a request to report traffic reported by the traffic measurement component at step 1206. The flow model records information about the attributes with which to package to be agreed upon. For example, as shown in FIG. 18, the above periodic control packet stream may have feature information in six bytes of the packet payload. For example, the feature information in the uplink heartbeat stream is 0x64, and the feature information in the downlink heartbeat stream is 0x65. In such a case, the flow model may be pre-specified with a matching function, filterStr, where 0x64 is matched to the uplink flow, and 0x65 is matched to the downlink flow, where the matching position is offset by 6 bytes from the UDP protocol payload.

As shown in FIG. 19, the code logic may use the memcmp function to compare whether the content of the packet matches the configured matching function, filterStr. The specific code looks like: if (memcmp(rpt_cfg->filter_str[i], payload + filter_str_offset, rpt_cfg->filter_str_len[i]) == 0), where the memcmp function compares and receives the packet matched with the matching function, filterStr, so thereby filtering out the stream of periodic control packets from the target stream.

Step S3: Reporting a consistent target thread and statistical information about that target thread according to the thread reporting policy.

In particular, the filtered packets of the target flow can be stored in the SKB queue and reported periodically or immediately according to the target flow message policy.

If packets are reported periodically, a portion or some of the packets received by the target flow in that period (eg, the last packet of the target flow received in that period) may be reported to traffic measurement component 133 at the end of each period. Optionally, packet statistical information (eg, the number of packets and the total number of bytes in the packets) of the target flow in the current period can be further reported to the traffic measurement component 133 .

If packets are reported immediately, matched packets can be directly reported to the traffic measurement component.

Through the above procedure, packets of the target flow can be precisely matched and filtered in the traffic reporting component, and the reported packets can be used in the traffic measurement component to evaluate the performance of the network.

Step 1402: Traffic measurement component 133 analyzes packets reported by traffic reporting component 141 to obtain packet analysis results.

At this point, the traffic measurement component 133 can perform a flow-level assessment of network performance. With respect to the network performance parameter used in assessing the network performance for each target flow, references may be made to the examples in Table 2. The parameter for assessing the network performance for each target flow may be passed to the traffic measurement component 133 at step 1206.

At this point, the resulting packet analysis result may be a flow-level analysis result, such as whether the quality of the target flow is good or bad.

To implement the network quality assessment for each flow, references may be made to the corresponding description of step 311, so the details will not be described again here.

Step 1403: The traffic measurement component 133 transmits the packet analysis result to the flow-level path control component 131.

In particular, the above packet analysis result may include: identification information for the target stream and information for describing whether the quality of the target stream is good or bad.

In fig. 20 shows, taking as an example a network application that is a gaming application, a possible implementation of code for transmitting a target stream and a network performance evaluation result for that target stream to a thread-level path control component 131 for scheduling multi-stream switching.

Step 1404: Flow-level path control component 131 determines that a channel should be switched based on the result of the packet analysis and determines whether an alternative network channel is available. If yes, perform step 1414; and if not, perform step 1405.

To implement steps 1405 - 1413, reference may be made to steps 1304 - 1312, so the details will not be described again here.

Step 1414: The flow-level path control component 131 transmits the identification information of the target low-quality flow and the alternate network path path to the flow-level policy control component 132.

Specifically, when determining that the quality of the target flow is poor according to the packet analysis results of each target flow, the flow-level path control component 131 may transmit identification information of the target flow with poor quality and the path of the alternative network channel to the flow-level policy control component 132 flow.

Step 1415: The flow-level policy control component 132 transmits a channel switch command to the policy execution component 142.

Specifically, after receiving the identification information of the target poor quality flow and the alternate network path path transmitted by the flow level path control component 131, the flow level policy control component 132 can determine a flow switching policy corresponding to the target poor quality flow to determine the switching the network application stream from the set of streams carried on the same network channel as the target poor quality stream, in accordance with the stream switching policy, and transmitting the channel switching command to component 142 to execute the policy, where the channel switching command can be used to instruct the policy execution component 142 to switch the stream to be switched from the current primary network channel (eg, a primary network channel) to an alternative network channel (eg, a cellular channel) so that the channel switch can be performed faster, latency , caused by channel switching, can be reduced, and the experience for the user can be improved.

For example, as shown in FIG. 11a, all streams - stream A, stream B and stream C - of the network application are transmitted on Wi-Fi channel 1, stream A is the target stream, and the stream switching policy corresponding to stream A is: stream A and stream B. In this case , if the network performance of flow A becomes poor, it can be determined that flow A and flow B of the network application in question are flows to be switched according to the flow switching policy corresponding to flow A. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 11b, the flow-level policy control component 132 may cause, through a channel switch command, the policy execution component 142 to switch stream A and stream B to an alternative network channel, in other words, to the Mobile 1 channel shown in FIG. 11b. Continuing with this example, suppose that the flow switching policy corresponding to flow A is: flow A, flow B and flow C. In such a case, if the network performance for flow A has become poor, it can be determined that flow A, flow B and thread C of the network application in question are threads to be switched according to the thread switching policy corresponding to thread A. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 11c, the flow-level policy control component 132 may cause, through a channel switch command, the policy execution component 142 to switch stream A, stream B, and stream C to an alternative network channel, in other words, to the Mobile 1 channel shown in FIG. 11c.

In fig. 21 shows, taking as an example that the network application is a gaming application, a possible code implementation for obtaining a stream to be switched in the network application through the flow-level policy control component 132 by viewing all types of service streams.

Step 1416: The policy execution component 142 performs a channel switch.

In particular, upon receiving a channel switch command sent by the thread-level policy control component 132, the policy execution component 142 may switch multiple network application threads to be switched from the current network channel to an alternative network channel. In other words, other threads of the network application can continue to transmit and operate on the current network channel, and multiple streams to be switched can transmit and operate on an alternative network channel, so that the switch can be accomplished quickly, thereby ensuring quality of service and experience for the user.

In the above channel switching method shown in FIG. 12 – fig. 14b, thread-level channel switching scheduling is extended, and single-thread scheduling is extended to multiple-thread scheduling. In some embodiments, a network performance assessment result for a single thread of a network application can be obtained quickly, and this assessment result can be applied to the type of flow (for example, a latency-sensitive flow) of the network application, thereby reducing the likelihood of service operation lag caused by flow of this type, and improving the experience for the user.

Example

The voice stream of the game Peace Elite contains a stream of periodic control packets with a period of 1 second. This voice stream can be used as a target stream for a gaming application. The traffic reporting component may determine a stream of periodic control packets in the voice stream. The round trip time of the network for the voice stream may be calculated by the traffic measurement component according to the flow of periodic control packets in the voice stream to evaluate the performance of the network for the voice stream. When network performance becomes poor, the evaluation result can be applied to all latency-sensitive streams within the entire game (eg, game streams and voice streams), and network channel switching is performed for all latency-sensitive streams of that game.

By using the channel hopping method of embodiments of the present application, there is no need to accurately obtain a packet from each flow in a network application and evaluate the network performance of each flow, which can reduce the number of flows that an electronic device needs to monitor and evaluate, and thereby reduce the amount of processing. data in an electronic device. In addition, when the quality of the network channel becomes poor, channel switching is performed for multiple flows (for example, the same type of flows) in time, which reduces the possibility of service operation delay caused by poor network quality for multiple flows, thereby reducing the manifestation of service operation delay and improving perception for the user.

One embodiment of the present application further provides an electronic device, where the device includes a storage medium and a central processing unit, the storage medium may be a non-volatile medium, and a computer-executable program is stored on the storage medium. The central processing unit is coupled to the nonvolatile storage medium and executes said computer-executable program for implementing the method of any of the embodiments of the present application shown in FIG. 7 – fig. 15.

One embodiment of the present application further provides an electronic device comprising: one or more processors; Memory device; and one or more computer programs, wherein the one or more computer programs are stored in a storage device, the one or more computer programs comprising instructions that cause the device to carry out the method of any of the embodiments of the present application shown in FIG. 7 – fig. 15.

One embodiment of the present application further provides a computer-readable storage medium, wherein the computer-readable storage medium stores a computer program such that when the computer program runs on a computer, such computer implements the method provided by any of the embodiments of the present application illustrated in fig. 7 – fig. 15.

One embodiment of the present application further provides a computer program product, wherein the computer program product comprises a computer program such that, when executing the computer program, the computer implements the method provided by any of the embodiments of the present application shown in FIG. 7 – fig. 15.

It should be understood that in order to perform the above functions, an electronic device or other similar device contains hardware structures and/or software modules to perform a variety of related functions. One of ordinary skill in the art will readily appreciate that, in combination with the modules and steps of the example algorithms discussed in the embodiments provided herein, embodiments of the present application may be implemented by hardware or a combination of hardware and computer software. Whether a function is implemented by hardware or by computer software that controls that hardware depends on the specific application and design constraints of the hardware. One skilled in the art may employ various techniques to implement the described functionality for each specific application, but such implementations should not be considered beyond the scope of the embodiments of this application.

In embodiments of the present application, the division of an electronic device into functional modules can be carried out in accordance with example methods. For example, partitioning into different function modules can be done according to the respective functions, or two or more functions can be integrated in one processor module. Such an integrated module may be implemented in the form of hardware or in the form of a software functional module. It should be noted that the modularization shown in the subject embodiment of the present application is only an example and is simply a partitioning of logical functions, so other partitioning methods may be used in an actual application.

Based on the description of the above embodiments, one skilled in the art can clearly understand that for the sake of convenience and brevity of the description, the breakdown into the above-mentioned functional modules is used as an example only. In an actual application, the above functions can be assigned and executed by various function modules according to specific requirements. In other words, the internal structure of the equipment is divided into various functional modules to perform all or some of the functions discussed above. For information about the specific operating procedures of the system, apparatus and modules mentioned above, reference may be made to the corresponding procedures or method variations above, so the details will not be described again here.

The functional modules in embodiments of the present application may be integrated within a single processor module, or each of these modules may exist physically separately, or two or more modules may be integrated within a single module. An integrated module may be implemented in the form of hardware, or may be implemented in the form of a functional software module.

When an integrated module is implemented in the form of a software function module and is sold or used as an independent product, the integrated module may be stored on a computer-readable storage medium. Based on this understanding, the technical solutions of the embodiments of the present application, mainly or in part corresponding to related fields of technology, or all or part of such technical solutions, can be implemented in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product is stored on a storage medium and contains a number of instructions for controlling a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device) or a processor to carry out some or all of the steps of the method described in the embodiments of this application. Said storage medium may be any medium capable of storing program code, such as a flash memory device, a removable hard disk, a read only memory, a random access memory, a magnetic disk, or an optical disk.

The foregoing description merely relates to specific embodiments of this application and is not intended to limit the scope of protection of this application. Any variations or substitutions within the technical scope of this application will fall within the scope of the application. Therefore, the scope of protection of the present application corresponds to the scope of protection of the Claims.

Claims (34)

1. A channel switching method implemented in an electronic device comprising a first network channel and a second network channel, the method comprising the steps of: launching a first application, the first application comprising a first data stream, a second data stream, and a third data stream, and said first data stream, second data stream, and third data stream are transmitted over the first network channel; And switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel if it is determined that the quality of the network for the first application does not satisfy a given condition, and keeping the third data stream carried by the first network channel unchanged. 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the first data stream and the second data stream are data streams sensitive to the same parameter, and said parameter is at least one of: delay, packet loss ratio, data rate or bandwidth. 3. The method according to claim 2, in which the step of determining that the quality of the network for the first application does not satisfy a given condition contains a substep in which: determining, in accordance with a parameter to which the first data flow is sensitive, that the quality of the network for the first application does not satisfy a predetermined condition. 4. The method according to claim 3, in which the step of determining, in accordance with the parameter to which the first data flow is sensitive, that the quality of the network for the first application does not satisfy a given condition, contains sub-steps in which: receiving a packet from a first data stream of the plurality of packets transmitted over the first network channel; calculating a parameter to which the first data stream is sensitive in accordance with the received packet; And determining that the calculated parameter does not satisfy a given condition corresponding to the specified parameter. 5. The method according to claim 4, in which the step of obtaining a packet from the first data stream from a plurality of packets transmitted over the first network channel contains substeps in which: receive packets transmitted over the first network channel; determining that said packets contain identification information of the first application; And determining that the specified packets contain the specified matching function for the first data stream. 6. The method according to claim 1, further comprising, before the step of switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel, the steps of: obtain network channels in a state of availability in the electronic device, except for the first network channel in case of a change in the environment; carry out an appropriate assessment of the quality of network channels in the state of availability; selecting a second network channel with the best quality as an alternative network channel in accordance with the quality evaluation result; And activate an alternative network channel. 7. The method of claim 6, wherein the step of switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel comprises a sub-step of: switching, upon determining that there is a second network channel activated and used as an alternative network channel, the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel. 8. The method according to claim 1, in which the step of switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel further comprises sub-steps in which: obtaining network channels in an available state in the electronic device, excluding the first network channel in case of determining that there is no alternative network channel activated; carry out an appropriate assessment of the quality of the specified network channels in the state of availability; selecting a second network channel with the best quality as an alternative network channel in accordance with the quality evaluation result; activate the second network channel used as an alternative network channel; And switching the network channel carrying the first data stream and the second data stream to the second network channel. 9. The method according to claim 1, further comprising, before the step of determining that the quality of the network for the first application does not satisfy a given condition, a step in which: determining that the first application is an application from a given white list. 10. The method of claim 1, wherein the network channel is a Wi-Fi channel or a cellular channel, and the second network channel is a Wi-Fi channel or a cellular channel. 11. The method of claim 1, wherein said first application is a gaming application, the first data stream is a voice stream, and the second data stream is a game stream; or the first application is a video playback application, the first data stream is a voice stream, and the second data stream is a video stream. 12. An electronic channel switching device containing: a processor; and a storage device, wherein said storage device is configured to store computer program code containing commands that cause, when said commands are read from the storage device, execution by an electronic device of a method according to any one of claims. 1–11. 13. A machine-readable storage medium containing computer commands that cause, when executed by an electronic device, the execution of the method according to any one of claims. 1–11.