CN108337720B

CN108337720B - WLAN equipment power saving mode implementation method and device

Info

Publication number: CN108337720B
Application number: CN201810031843.6A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 杨富华
Original assignee: Shenzhen Quanzhi Online Co ltd
Current assignee: Shenzhen Quanzhi Online Co ltd
Priority date: 2018-01-12
Filing date: 2018-01-12
Publication date: 2021-11-12
Anticipated expiration: 2038-01-12
Also published as: CN108337720A

Abstract

The invention relates to a method for realizing a power saving mode of WLAN (wireless local area network) equipment, which comprises the following steps: step 1, calculating a communication load c in a statistical time period; step 2, adjusting a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c, wherein the parameter T is increased along with the increase of the communication load c; and step 3, updating the idle active time of the power saving mode to be the parameter T. By combining with an interactive protocol of the WLAN power saving mode, the statistics of the size of the communication load is used as feedback, and the parameter values in the power saving mode, such as idle active time, are dynamically adjusted, so that the throughput and communication delay performance are improved, and meanwhile, the power consumption is not obviously increased.

Description

WLAN equipment power saving mode implementation method and device

Technical Field

The invention relates to the field of Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN), in particular to a method and a device for realizing a WLAN device power saving mode.

Background

For wireless devices, performance and power consumption are very important parameter indicators, especially in handheld devices with large data transmission volumes. The two parameter indexes have a contradictory relation in practice, and the power consumption is usually sacrificed while the performance is ensured, and vice versa. Due to the overhead of protocol interaction, the power saving mode of the WLAN device has a certain impact on performance, especially in a long-distance or strong interference environment. In practice, the requirements for performance and power consumption are often dynamic, for example, when performing communication services, it is desirable to prioritize performance, and when waiting for a long time, it is preferable to prioritize power consumption. In the prior art, power saving mode operation parameters of WLAN devices are implemented more fixedly, and although power consumption is lower, throughput and communication delay performance are greatly affected, and a scenario with a priority performance cannot be well adapted.

Under the IEEE802.11 mechanism, an STA (Station) device has two power management modes, namely, a power saving mode and an active mode, and the power saving mode has two operating states, namely, an awake state and a sleep state. Under the waking state, the equipment enters a normal working state, all circuits work normally, and the equipment has complete frame receiving and transmitting capability. In the sleep state, the device enters a low power state, and the transceiver circuitry may be turned off to conserve power. The device operates in an active mode and can only be in an awake state, while in a power-saving mode, the device will switch between the awake state and the sleep state as specified by the IEEE802.11 conventional power management mechanism.

Patent application No. 201510140728.9 discloses a method for improving frame fetching efficiency of STA devices. For the 802.11 legacy power saving mode, the method disclosed in 201510140728.9 for improving the frame fetching efficiency of the STA device is more efficient. As shown in fig. 1 (the lower side of the horizontal axis is a state, and the upper side is a transceiving frame), after an STA (Station) enters a sleep state, when an AP (access point) has data to be sent to the STA, the AP may buffer the data, and then notify the STA of the buffered data through TIM indication information of a beacon frame. After receiving the TIM indication message of beacon, the STA sends a NULL frame to the AP to indicate switching to the awake state, at which time the AP may send all buffered data to the STA. If no data is transceived during the idle active time T, the STA may send a NULL frame indication to the AP to enter the sleep state again.

Because data in the network is burst, the interval for transmitting data by the AP is not fixed, and especially when the AP and the STA are far apart or the environmental interference is large, there are many error packets and retransmissions, and the interval for receiving correct data by the STA may be relatively large.

If the value of T is set to be smaller, the interval of receiving data is greater than T, the STA can easily enter the dormant state again, the data frame to be sent by the AP must be indicated again through the TIM information of beacon, and the data frame can be sent only after the STA enters the active state, so that the efficiency is reduced, and the sudden drop of the throughput performance or the larger communication delay is caused.

If the value of T is set to be large, the STA must wait for a long time to go to sleep after receiving data each time, which results in a long time for being in an active state under a low communication load and greatly increases power consumption.

Disclosure of Invention

Aiming at the defects in the prior art, the invention provides a method and a device for realizing the power saving mode of the WLAN equipment, which improve the throughput and communication delay performance of the power saving mode of the WLAN equipment and have very small influence on power consumption.

The technical scheme adopted by the invention for solving the technical problems is as follows: a method for realizing a power saving mode of WLAN equipment is provided, which comprises the following steps: step 1, calculating a communication load c in a statistical time period; step 2, adjusting a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c, wherein the parameter T is increased along with the increase of the communication load c; and step 3, updating the idle active time of the power saving mode to be the parameter T.

The communication load c is the total number of data frames received by the WLAN device in the statistical time period.

The adjusting the parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c in step 2 specifically includes: step 2.1, presetting a load factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin and an idle active time adjustment factor t 0; step 2.2, the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the sum of the product of the communication load C and the idle active time adjustment factor T0, divided by the load factor C, and the idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin.

The step 2 further comprises: presetting an idle active time upper limit threshold value Tmax, and when the parameter T of the power saving mode is larger than the idle active time upper limit threshold value Tmax, the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the idle active time upper limit threshold value Tmax.

The present invention also provides a storage device, in which a plurality of instructions are stored, the instructions being adapted to be loaded by a processor and to perform the WLAN device power saving mode implementation method according to any of claims 1 to 4.

The invention also provides a device for realizing the power saving mode of the WLAN equipment, which comprises a transceiving unit, a statistical unit, a power saving mode unit and a protocol control unit, wherein the transceiving unit carries out data interaction with the access point; the method comprises the steps that a statistic unit calculates communication load c in a statistic time period, and adjusts a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c, wherein the parameter T is increased along with the increase of the communication load c; the power saving mode unit updates the idle active time of the power saving mode to be the parameter T; the power saving mode unit controls the transceiver module through the protocol control unit.

The communication load c is the total number of data frames received by the WLAN device in a statistical time period.

The statistical unit comprises a parameter presetting module and a parameter T calculating module, wherein the parameter presetting module presets a load factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin and an idle active time adjusting factor T0; and a parameter T calculation module, which is used for calculating the parameter T of the power saving mode, wherein the calculated parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the sum of the product of the communication load C and the idle active time adjustment factor T0, the product of the communication load C and the idle active time adjustment factor C, the product of the load factor C and the idle active time adjustment factor T0, and the idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin.

The statistical unit further comprises a judging module: presetting an idle active time upper limit threshold value Tmax, and when the parameter T of the power saving mode is larger than the idle active time upper limit threshold value Tmax, the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the idle active time upper limit threshold value Tmax.

The invention has the advantages that the interactive protocol of the WLAN power saving mode is combined, the statistics of the communication load size is used as feedback, the parameter values in the power saving mode, such as idle active time, are dynamically adjusted, the throughput and communication delay performance are improved, and meanwhile, the power consumption is not obviously increased.

Drawings

The invention will be further described with reference to the accompanying drawings and examples, in which:

FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating AP and STA interaction in a prior art WLAN power saving mode;

FIG. 2 is a network topology diagram of a network system according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 3 is a flowchart 100 of a WLAN device power saving mode implementation method according to an embodiment of the invention;

fig. 4 is a flowchart 200 of a WLAN device power saving mode implementation method according to another embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 5 is a flowchart 300 of a WLAN device power saving mode implementation method according to another embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 6 is a block diagram of an apparatus 400 for implementing a power saving mode of a WLAN device according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 7 is a block diagram of an embodiment of a statistical unit in the apparatus 400 for implementing power saving mode of the WLAN device shown in fig. 6;

FIG. 8 is a block diagram of a statistical unit in the apparatus 400 for implementing power saving mode of WLAN device shown in FIG. 6 according to another embodiment

Detailed Description

The technical solutions in the embodiments of the present invention will be clearly and completely described below with reference to the drawings in the embodiments of the present invention, and it is obvious that the described embodiments are only a part of the embodiments of the present invention, and not all of the embodiments. All other embodiments, which can be derived by a person skilled in the art from the embodiments given herein without making any creative effort, shall fall within the protection scope of the present invention.

The embodiment of the invention provides a method for realizing a power saving mode of WLAN equipment, which is used for dynamically adjusting parameters of the power saving mode of the WLAN equipment so as to improve the throughput and communication delay performance of a long-distance or interference environment.

Fig. 2 is a diagram showing a topology of a typical network to which the technical solution of the present invention is applied, and according to fig. 2, a wireless lan 100 includes: an Access Point (AP) 120, and a Station (STA) 110 and 114 accessing the network through the Access Point 120, wherein the STA 110 and 114 associated with the same AP 120 form a Basic Service Set (BSS); the wireless lan 100 is connected to a backbone network 140 through a gateway 130 and further connected to a server 150 in the network. The wireless local area network may be a local area network conforming to an 802.11 communication protocol, such as WIFI, bluetooth, etc.

It should be noted that the STA in the embodiment of the present invention refers to a basic logical entity in a wireless local area network, and the STA may specifically be a terminal device including a wireless local area network interface, for example, many mobile phones, tablet computers, and the like in the current market support the wireless local area network interface, and the portable device also has a built-in wireless local area network interface. For some devices which do not have the wireless local area network interface, the wireless local area network interface can be provided by installing a WLAN wireless network card.

Fig. 3 is a flowchart 100 of a method for implementing a power saving mode of a WLAN device according to an embodiment of the present invention, where the method includes:

step 101: the communication load c within the statistical time period is calculated. In particular embodiments, the communication load c may be a total number of data frames received by the STA within the statistical time period.

The statistical time period may be set according to actual test requirements. As a preferred embodiment, the statistical time period may be set to 1000 ms.

Step 103: and adjusting the parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c, wherein the parameter T is increased along with the increase of the communication load c.

In an embodiment, the idle active time of the power saving mode may be calculated according to the communication load c. In the specific embodiment, it is required to ensure that the parameter T increases with the increase of the communication load c, and the present invention does not limit the specific adjustment method.

Step 105: and updating the idle active time of the power saving mode to be a parameter T.

The invention combines the interactive protocol of the WLAN power saving mode, dynamically adjusts the parameter value in the power saving mode by taking the statistics of the communication load size as feedback, improves the throughput and communication delay performance, and simultaneously ensures that the power consumption is not obviously increased.

Fig. 4 is a flowchart 200 of a WLAN device power saving mode implementation method according to another embodiment of the present invention, wherein

steps

201 and 207 may be the same as

steps

101 and 105 in fig. 3, respectively.

In step 203, a loading factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin, and an idle active time adjustment factor T0 are preset for calculating a parameter T of the power saving mode. In a specific embodiment, the above parameters may be set according to a test situation. As a preferred embodiment, the loading factor C may be set to 10 frames, the idle active time lower threshold Tmin may be set to 50ms, and the idle active time adjustment factor t0 may be set to 50 ms.

Step 205, calculating a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load C counted in step 201 and the load factor C, the idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin, and the idle active time adjustment factor T0 preset in step 203. In the embodiment, it is also ensured that the parameter T increases with the increase of the communication load c, and the invention does not limit the implementation method. For example, the parameter T may be calculated using the following formula:

T＝Tmin+t0*c/C

the above formula is only an example, the parameter T increases with the increase of the communication load c, and there may be other formulas and algorithms to implement, or may be implemented by a Look-Up-Table (LUT).

When the communication load is larger, the idle active time is increased, and the times of entering power-saving interaction are reduced, so that the communication efficiency and the throughput performance are improved; when the communication load is small, the time of idle activity is properly reduced, and the time of the dormant state is increased, so that the increase of power consumption is avoided.

Fig. 5 is a flowchart 300 of a WLAN device power saving mode implementation method according to another embodiment of the present invention, wherein step 301, step 305, and step 311 are the same as step 201, step 205, and step 207 in fig. 4, respectively.

Step 303, presetting a load factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin, an idle active time adjustment factor T0, and also presetting an idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax, which is used for calculating a parameter T of the power saving mode. In a specific embodiment, the above parameters may be set according to a test situation. As a preferred embodiment, the loading factor C may be set to 10 frames, the idle active time lower threshold Tmin may be 50ms, the idle active time lower threshold Tmax may be 1000ms, and the idle active time adjustment factor t0 may be 50 ms.

Step 307, determining the parameter T of the power saving mode calculated in step 305, and when T is greater than a preset idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax, executing step 309, that is, T is equal to Tmax. Thereby ensuring that the idle active time is within a certain range and not too large. Too long an idle active time may increase the power consumption of the WLAN device.

The implementation method of the WLAN equipment power saving mode is proved to be feasible through experimental tests. Under the same environment with stable interference, the same WLAN device is tested, and the average value in table 1 is obtained through 20 times of alternate tests by comparing the two cases of using the technical scheme of the present invention and not using the technical scheme of the present invention.

TABLE 1

As can be seen from the data in table 1, the average throughput of the WLAN device adopting the technical solution of the present invention is increased by 33.1%, the average delay is reduced by 12.4%, and the average power consumption is increased by only 5% compared with the WLAN device not using the technical solution of the present invention.

According to the scheme, the communication load size in the time period is calculated and counted, the idle active time is dynamically adjusted, and the throughput and delay performance, especially the throughput and delay performance in a long-distance or interference environment, is optimized on the premise of not obviously increasing the power consumption.

It should be understood that the present invention does not limit the execution sequence of each step in the WLAN device power saving mode implementation method, and the execution sequence of each step may be adjusted according to actual requirements, so as to implement the technical solution of the present invention. When any embodiment may be implemented in any other manner, the functions or operations specified in the specific blocks may be performed differently from the flows specified in the flowcharts. For example, two blocks shown in succession may, in fact, perform the function or operation concurrently, and the two blocks may, in turn, perform the function or operation in accordance with the related operation or function.

It will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that each step of the WLAN device power saving mode implementation method of the present invention can be implemented as a system, method or computer program product. Thus, various aspects of the invention may be embodied in the form of: an entirely hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment (including firmware, resident software, micro-code, etc.) or an embodiment combining hardware and software aspects.

It will be understood that each block of the flowchart illustrations, and combinations of blocks in the flowchart illustrations, can be implemented by computer program instructions. These computer program instructions may be provided to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a machine, such that the instructions, which execute via the processor of the computer or other programmable data processing apparatus, create means for implementing the functions specified in the flowchart block or blocks. Computer program code for carrying out operations for aspects of the present invention may be written in any combination of one or more programming languages, including an object oriented programming language such as Java, C + + or C.

These computer program instructions may also be stored in a computer readable medium that can direct a computer, other programmable data processing apparatus, or other devices to function in a particular manner, such that the instructions stored in the computer readable medium produce an article of manufacture including instructions which implement the function/act specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks. The computer readable storage medium may be a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a Random Access Memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or flash memory), a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), an optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. A computer readable storage medium may be any tangible medium that can contain, or store a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device.

The computer program instructions may also be loaded onto a computer, other programmable data processing apparatus, or other devices to cause a series of operational steps to be performed on the computer, other programmable apparatus or other devices to produce a computer implemented process such that the instructions which execute on the computer or other programmable apparatus provide processes for implementing the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.

The invention also provides a device for realizing the power saving mode of the WLAN equipment. Fig. 6 is a block diagram of an apparatus 400 for implementing a power saving mode of a WLAN device according to an embodiment of the present invention. The host device refers to a basic logic entity STA in a wireless local area network, and may specifically be a terminal device including a wireless local area network interface, for example, many mobile phones, tablet computers, and the like in the current market support the wireless local area network interface, and the portable device also has a built-in wireless local area network interface. The WLAN device power saving mode implementation device can be independent of the host device, and can also be integrated in the host device.

As shown in fig. 6, the apparatus 400 for implementing a power saving mode of a WLAN device includes a transceiver 401, a statistic unit 403, a power saving mode unit 405, and a protocol control unit 407.

The transceiver unit 401 interacts with an Access Point (AP) through a wireless transmission medium to receive data received by the access point from a network side or transmit data to the access point, and the wireless transmission medium may include radio waves, microwaves, infrared rays, and the like, which is not limited by the present invention.

The statistic unit 403 calculates a communication load c of the transceiver module 401 during a statistic time period, and adjusts a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load, wherein the parameter T increases with the increase of the communication load. In the specific embodiment, the invention does not limit the specific adjustment method to ensure that the parameter T increases with the increase of the communication load c.

The power saving mode unit 405 updates the idle active time to the parameter T.

The power saving mode unit 405 controls the state and behavior of the transceiver module 401 through the protocol control unit 407. In a specific embodiment, the protocol control unit 407 may control the state and behavior of the transceiver module 401 according to an interaction protocol of the WLAN power saving mode. For example, the protocol control unit 407 may control the state and behavior of the transceiver module 401 according to the interaction protocol disclosed in the patent application No. 201510140728.9.

The technical scheme of dynamically adjusting the idle active time in the power saving mode of the WLAN system is realized, and the throughput and communication delay performance of the WLAN system, especially the throughput and communication delay performance in a long-distance or interference environment, is improved on the premise of not having great influence on the power consumption of the WLAN.

In an embodiment, the counting unit 403 may calculate a total number of data frames received by the transceiver module 401 in the counting time period by the WLAN device power saving mode implementing apparatus 400 as the communication load c. In a specific embodiment, the counting module 403 may respectively calculate the total number of data frames received and transmitted by the transceiver module 401, and the present invention only utilizes the total number of data frames received by the transceiver module 401 as the communication load c.

In one embodiment, as shown in FIG. 7, the statistic unit 403-A may include a parameter presetting module 403-A1 and a parameter T calculating module 403-A2, wherein the parameter presetting module 403-A1 presets a load factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin and an idle active time adjustment factor T0; the parameter T calculation module 403-a2 calculates the parameter T of the power saving mode according to the preset load factor C, the idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin, the idle active time adjustment factor T0 and the communication load C calculated by the statistic unit 403.

In the embodiment, it is also ensured that the parameter T increases with the increase of the communication load c, and the invention does not limit the implementation method. For example, the following calculation formula may be employed:

T＝Tmin+t0*c/C

In a specific embodiment, the above parameters may be set according to a test situation. As a preferred embodiment, the loading factor C may be set to 10 frames, the idle active time lower threshold Tmin may be set to 50ms, and the idle active time adjustment factor t0 may be set to 50 ms.

In one embodiment, as shown in FIG. 8, the statistic unit 403-B may further include a parameter presetting module 403-B1, a parameter T calculating module 403-B2 and a judging module 403-B3. The load factor C, the idle active time lower threshold Tmin, the idle active time adjustment factor t0, and the idle active time upper threshold Tmax may be preset by the parameter preset modules 403-B1.

T＝Tmin+t0*c/C

After the parameter T calculating module 403-B2 calculates the power saving mode parameter T, the determining module 403-B3 determines that the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax when the parameter T is greater than the idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax. Thereby ensuring that the idle active time is within a certain range and not too large. Too long an idle active time may increase the power consumption of the WLAN device. As a preferred embodiment, the idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax may be preset to be 1000 ms.

According to the scheme, the operation parameters of the power saving mode are dynamically adjusted through statistics of communication loads, so that the throughput and communication delay performance of the WLAN equipment in a remote or interference environment are improved in the power saving mode, and meanwhile, the influence on power consumption is very small.

It is to be understood that when any embodiment is implemented in any other way, it is possible to perform the specified functions or operations in a different way than shown in the block diagrams. For example, two blocks shown in succession may, in fact, perform the function or act in the same manner.

It should be understood that the above embodiments are only used for illustrating the technical solutions of the present invention, and not for limiting the same, and those skilled in the art can modify the technical solutions described in the above embodiments, or make equivalent substitutions for some technical features; and all such modifications and alterations are intended to fall within the scope of the appended claims.

Claims

1. A method for implementing a power saving mode of a WLAN device is characterized by comprising the following steps:

step 1: calculating a communication load c in a statistical time period;

step 2: adjusting a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c, wherein the parameter T is increased along with the increase of the communication load c;

adjusting the parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c specifically includes:

presetting a load factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin, an idle active time adjustment factor t0 and an idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax;

the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the sum of the product of the communication load C and the idle active time adjustment factor T0 divided by the load factor C and the idle active time lower threshold Tmin;

when the parameter T of the power saving mode is larger than the upper idle active time threshold Tmax, the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the upper idle active time threshold Tmax;

and step 3: and updating the idle active time of the power saving mode to be the parameter T.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the communication load c is a total number of data frames received by the WLAN device within the statistical time period.

3. A storage device having stored therein a plurality of instructions adapted to be loaded by a processor and to perform the WLAN device power saving mode implementing method of any one of claims 1 to 2.

4. An apparatus for implementing a power saving mode of a WLAN device, comprising:

the receiving and sending unit is used for carrying out data interaction with the access point;

the statistical unit is used for calculating a communication load c in a statistical time period and adjusting a parameter T of the power saving mode according to the communication load c, wherein the parameter T is increased along with the increase of the communication load c;

the statistical unit comprises a parameter presetting module, a parameter T calculating module and a judging module,

the parameter presetting module is used for presetting a load factor C, an idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin, an idle active time adjustment factor t0 and an idle active time upper limit threshold Tmax;

a parameter T of the power saving mode calculated by the parameter T calculation module, where the parameter T is equal to a sum of a product of the communication load C and the idle active time adjustment factor T0 divided by the load factor C and the idle active time lower limit threshold Tmin;

the judging module judges that the parameter T of the power saving mode is equal to the upper limit threshold Tmax of the idle active time when the parameter T of the power saving mode is larger than the upper limit threshold Tmax of the idle active time;

a power saving mode unit which updates idle active time of the power saving mode to the parameter T;

and the power saving mode unit controls the transceiver module through the protocol control unit.

5. The WLAN device power saving mode implementing apparatus of claim 4, wherein the communication load c is a total number of data frames received by the WLAN device within the statistical time period.