CN111132277B

CN111132277B - Communication method and communication device

Info

Publication number: CN111132277B
Application number: CN201811286992.3A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 陈铮
Original assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2018-10-31
Filing date: 2018-10-31
Publication date: 2021-10-26
Anticipated expiration: 2038-10-31
Also published as: CN111132277A; WO2020088455A1

Abstract

The application provides a communication method, which can save the resources of network equipment and improve the utilization rate of system resources. The method comprises the following steps: the network device determines N first time regions in one-to-one correspondence with the N first offsets according to any specific candidate time position (e.g., a first candidate time position) for the terminal device group, the duration of the first time region configured for the terminal device group, and the N first offsets configured for the terminal device group; the network equipment determines a first time position of each terminal equipment; and sending a first signal to the at least one terminal device at the first candidate time position, where the first signal is used to indicate whether the plurality of terminal devices start to detect the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from the respective corresponding at least one first time position, where the at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices is located in the first time region corresponding to the terminal device.

Description

Communication method and communication device

Technical Field

The present application relates to the field of communications, and more particularly, to a communication method and a communication apparatus.

Background

In a New Radio (NR) communication system, in order to reduce power consumption of a terminal device, a Discontinuous Reception (DRX) technique is proposed. In the DRX mode, the terminal device may detect a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) at an Active Time (Active Time) within a DRX cycle (DRX cycle), and turn off the receiving circuit to enter a sleep state during the rest of the period, thereby reducing power consumption of the terminal. Wherein the activation time comprises an "on duration" time.

In one DRX cycle, the terminal device first wakes up from a sleep state, starts a radio frequency and a baseband circuit, acquires time-frequency synchronization, and then detects a PDCCH within an "on duration" time, which require a lot of power consumption. If the network device does not have any data scheduling for the terminal device during the "on duration" time, unnecessary energy consumption is generated for the terminal device. Therefore to further save power consumption, a technique of Wake Up Signal (WUS) in combination with DRX mechanism is introduced in NR. Specifically, for a terminal device supporting WUS, the "on duration" time of each DRX cycle corresponds to a WUS time (WUS occasion) at which the WUS is transmitted, the network device determines whether to transmit the WUS at the WUS time according to the requirement of scheduling data, and the terminal device needs to determine whether to transmit the WUS at the WUS time by detecting the WUS. On one hand, when the terminal device is in a sleep state, the terminal device can be in a state with extremely low power consumption, for example, the terminal device only turns on a part of modem (modem) functions or uses a simple receiving circuit to detect and demodulate the WUS, and on the other hand, if the terminal device does not detect the WUS signal at the WUS time or the WUS signal indicates that the terminal device has no data scheduling at the corresponding "on duration" time, the terminal device can directly enter the sleep state without detecting the PDCCH at the "on duration" time. Therefore, by combining WUS with the DRX mechanism, the power consumption of the terminal device can be further reduced.

There may be a plurality of terminal devices in a cell, and the DRX periods and the WUS time periods of the plurality of terminal devices, and the positions of the "on duration" and the WUS time in the time domain may be different from each other. For network devices, if the terminal devices are to wake up, WUS need to be sent at many different WUS times, that is, more time-frequency resources are needed to send WUS, thereby increasing the consumption and burden of network-side resources.

Disclosure of Invention

The application provides a communication method and a communication device, which can save resources of network equipment and improve the utilization rate of system resources.

In a first aspect, a communication method is provided, and includes:

respectively determining N first time regions according to a first candidate time position, the duration of the first time region and N first offsets configured for at least one terminal device, wherein the first candidate time position is any candidate time position in a plurality of candidate time positions, the candidate time positions are periodically distributed in a time domain, the N offsets are different from each other, N is an integer greater than or equal to 1, and each terminal device in the at least one terminal device is configured with one first offset in the N different first offsets;

determining a first time position of each terminal device;

transmitting a first signal for the at least one terminal device at the first candidate time position, the first signal indicating whether a terminal device of the at least one terminal device whose first time position is within the first time zone detects the first channel starting from the first time position.

Wherein the plurality of candidate temporal locations are for a group of terminal devices. In other words, the candidate time position corresponding to each first time position of each terminal device in the terminal device group belongs to the plurality of candidate time positions. And each terminal device in the terminal device group is configured with the duration of the first time zone.

In this application, the network device may send the first signal in the DTX mode at the candidate time position, or may send the first signal at the candidate time position in each period, which is not limited in this application.

In one possible implementation, for each DRX cycle of each terminal device, there is a candidate time position corresponding to it. Meanwhile, the first time position may be a starting position of the corresponding DRX cycle, or a starting position of "on duration" of the corresponding DRX cycle, or the first time position is a time slot or a subframe where the starting position of the corresponding DRX cycle or "on duration" is located. The terminal device may start a first timer (which may be a timer drx on duration timer) at the starting time slot or subframe (i.e., the first time position), or may start detecting the first channel. In a more general concept, the first time position may be a start position of an Active time period (Active time) of a terminal device DRX cycle, the DRX cycle Active time including a time length of "on duration" or a time length of the first timer. The specific meaning of the active period can refer to the technology in the existing DRX mechanism, and is not described herein.

In another possible implementation manner, the first time position may be a time position of a search space of a PDCCH of the terminal device, such as a time position of a downlink control channel search space closest to the candidate time position. For example, the first time position may be a time position of a PDCCH search space on a secondary carrier (SCell) activated by the terminal device that is closest to the candidate time position.

In this application, the network device configures one of N different first offsets for each terminal device in the terminal device group. The first offsets configured by the network device for different terminal devices in the terminal device group may be the same or different, that is, if the terminal device group includes J terminal devices, N is greater than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to J.

Alternatively, the unit of the first offset may be ms or a subframe or a slot, but this is not limited in this embodiment of the application. The unit of W may be the same as the unit of the first offset amount. Further, the first offset may take a value of 2ms, 3ms, 5ms, 10ms, 20ms, 40ms, 80ms, 160ms, and so on.

In the present application, the N first time regions correspond to the N first offsets one to one. That is, one first time region can be determined for each first offset. It should be understood that the N first time regions correspond to first candidate time positions, and that the determined first time regions are different for the candidate time positions in different candidate time position periods.

Optionally, for each first offset, a time distance between a starting time position of the first time region determined according to the first offset and the first candidate time position is the first offset. That is, the time distance between the start time position of each first time region and the first candidate time position is one of N first offsets, and the time distance between the start time position of each first time region and the first candidate time position is different from each other.

The "the first signal is used to indicate whether a terminal device whose first time position is located in the first time region starts to detect the first channel from the first time position" in the at least one terminal device means that the first signal is used to indicate whether a plurality of terminal devices start to detect the first channel from at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices or stop detecting the first channel, where the at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices is located in the first time region corresponding to the terminal device. Or, if one or more first time positions of a terminal device are located in a first time region corresponding to the terminal device, the first signal may indicate whether the terminal device starts to detect the first channel from the one or more first time positions or stops detecting the first channel.

Optionally, a time distance between a starting time position of a first time region where the first time position of any terminal device is located and the first candidate time position is a first offset configured for the terminal device.

It is noted that the step "transmitting the first signal for said at least one terminal device at said first candidate time position may or may not be performed".

Specifically, in the first implementation manner, if at least one terminal device in the terminal devices in the terminal device group whose first time position is in the first time zone needs to detect the first channel from the first time position in the corresponding first time zone, for example, if the network device needs to perform data scheduling on the terminal device # a in a certain first time period of the terminal device # a whose first time position is in the first time zone of the terminal device # a, the network device transmits the first signal at the first candidate time position. If any terminal device of the terminal device group whose first time position is in the first time zone does not need to detect the first channel from the first time position in the corresponding first time zone, the network device may not send any signal at the first candidate time position.

In the second implementation manner, the network device may transmit the first signal at the first candidate time position, regardless of whether the terminal device whose first time position in the terminal device group is located in the first time region needs to detect the first channel from the first time position in the corresponding first time region. It is to be understood that the first signal transmitted in implementation two may be different from the first signal transmitted in implementation two.

Optionally, the first channel is a downlink control channel, and the first time position is a start time position of the discontinuous reception activation time of the terminal device.

In the prior art, for terminal devices with different DRX cycles and offsets, WUS time needs to be configured to transmit WUS, that is, more time-frequency resources are needed to transmit WUS, thereby increasing the consumption and burden of network-side resources. In the method of the embodiment of the present application, the candidate time positions may be associated with a plurality of first offsets or a plurality of terminal devices, a plurality of first time regions may be determined according to the plurality of first offsets, and when the first time positions of the plurality of terminal devices fall into the respective corresponding first time regions, the first signal corresponding to the first time region may instruct the plurality of terminal devices to start detecting or stop detecting the first channel from the corresponding first time positions, so that even if the periods (i.e., an example of the DRX periods) and the offsets of the candidate time positions of the terminal devices are different, the purpose of multiplexing the same first signal by the plurality of terminal devices may be achieved. That is, the network device does not need to transmit the first signal (i.e., an example of a WUS signal) on different time domain or frequency domain resources for each terminal device, so that resources of the network device can be saved, and the utilization rate of system resources can be improved.

With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, at least one bit of information bits carried by the first signal corresponds to at least one time unit in each first time region, and the at least one bit is used to indicate whether a terminal device, whose first time position is within the at least one time unit, of the at least one terminal device detects the first channel from the first time position.

Therefore, whether the terminal device detects the first channel can be indicated by fewer information bits, so that signaling overhead can be saved.

The first signal includes L information bits, and the first time zone is constituted by P time units, wherein P ≧ L ≧ 1, and P and L are integers.

For example, each information bit corresponds to at least one time unit of P time units included in each first time zone. Wherein the L information bits are used to indicate whether the terminal device whose first time position in the terminal device group is within P time units detects the first channel from the first time position. Or, the L information bits are used to indicate whether a plurality of terminal devices start to detect the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices, where the at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices is located in a first time region corresponding to the terminal device.

Further, the number of time units corresponding to each information bit in the L information bits is

Or

Wherein,

meaning that the rounding is done down,

indicating rounding up. Each information bit is used for indicating whether the terminal equipment of which the first time position in the terminal equipment group is located in the time unit corresponding to the information bit detects the first channel from the first time position.

In this application, the L information bits may correspond to time units in the first time region from the upper bits to the lower bits, but this is not limited in this embodiment of the present application.

As another example, L information bits correspond to P time units in each first time region. Each time unit in the P time units included in each first time region corresponds to a plurality of information bits in the L information bits. The plurality of information bits are used for indicating whether the terminal equipment of which the first time position in the terminal equipment group is located in the time unit corresponding to the plurality of information bits detects the first channel from the first time position. Or, the L information bits are used to indicate whether a plurality of terminal devices start to detect the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices, where the at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices is located in a first time region corresponding to the terminal device.

In this application, the time unit may be a slot or a subframe, but this is not limited in this embodiment of the application, for example, the time unit may also be a mini-slot (mini-slot) or a symbol, and the like.

In this application, the unit of the duration of the first time region and the unit of the time unit may be the same, or the granularity of the duration of the first time region is one time unit, for example, if the duration of the first time region is 10ms or 10 subframes, the first time region may be formed by 10 subframes, but the embodiment of the present application does not limit this.

Similarly, the first signal includes L information bits, and the first time zone is constituted by P time units, where P ≧ L ≧ 1, and P and L are integers. With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, each of the L information bits corresponds to at least one time unit of P time units included in one of the N first time regions.

Or

Or

Or

The first time region corresponding to each of the L information bits may be indicated according to a high-level signaling configuration or a Downlink Control Information (DCI) signaling.

With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, a time unit indicated by an L-th information bit of the L information bits is located at a p-th time unit in a first time region,

p is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to P, L is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to L, and L and P are integers.

It should be understood that the p-th time unit is an index or time unit numbered p-1.

With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, a period of the candidate time locations is equal to a duration of the first time zone.

With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, for each terminal device, a time distance between a first time position of the terminal device and the first candidate time position is a sum of a first offset configured for the terminal device and a second offset of the terminal device, where the second offset is greater than or equal to 0 and less than a duration of the first time zone.

With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, before the network device sends the first signal, an offset (i.e., a second offset) from a first time position in a corresponding first time region to the first time region may be first determined, and then information bits corresponding to the first time position are determined according to the second offset, so as to determine the first signal.

Wherein the second offset is greater than or equal to 0 and less than the duration of the first time zone. The unit of the second offset may be ms, or the granularity of the second offset may be a subframe or a slot, but the embodiment of the present application is not limited thereto.

Further, the second offset satisfies (Q-T-1-T) modR ═ o or (Q-T) modR ═ o, where Q is the first time position # 1. T is a first offset configured to the terminal device, T is a second offset of the terminal device, R is a period of the plurality of candidate time positions, and o is an offset of the plurality of candidate time positions. Wherein the value range of t is as follows: t is more than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to W-1 or t is more than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to W.

Specifically, if the units of T, R, and o are all time slots, the calculation formula of the first time position Q (i.e. the slot where the first time position is located) is:

wherein n is_t,fIs the frame number at which the first time position is located,

and numbering the time slot of the first time position.

Wherein

For the number of slots contained within a frame, see table 1 below.

If the units of T, R, and o are all subframes, the calculation formula of the first time position Q (i.e. the subframe where the first time position is located) is:

and numbering the subframe where the first time position is located.

In a second aspect, a communication method is provided, including:

determining a second offset according to a first time position, a period of a candidate time position of a first signal, a first offset configured to a terminal device and a duration of a first time zone, wherein the first time position is located in the first time zone;

determining a first candidate time position from a plurality of candidate time positions of the first signal according to the first time position, the first offset and the second offset, wherein the candidate time positions are periodically distributed on a time domain according to the period of the candidate time position;

detecting the first signal at the first candidate temporal location;

determining whether to detect a first channel from the first time position according to a detection result of the first signal.

It should be understood that the terminal device is any one of the terminal device groups in the above description, and the first time position is any one of a plurality of first time positions which may be periodically distributed.

In the method of the embodiment of the present application, the terminal device may determine the second offset according to the first time position, the period of the candidate time position of the first signal, the first offset configured to the terminal device, and the duration of the first time region, and then may determine the candidate time position (i.e., the first candidate time position) corresponding to the first time position according to the second offset, and further may determine whether to detect the first channel from the first time position according to a result of detecting the first signal at the first candidate time position. Specifically, the terminal device detects the first signal at the first candidate time position, and then the terminal device #1 may determine whether to detect the first channel from the first time position based on the first signal. If the terminal device does not detect the first signal at the first candidate time position, the terminal device does not detect the first channel from the first time position.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the method further includes:

and determining a first time zone where the first time position is located according to the second offset and the duration of the first time zone.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, a time distance between a starting position of a first time region where the first time position is located and the first candidate time position is the first offset.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, a time distance between the first candidate time position and the first time position is a sum of the first offset and the second offset.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the second offset is a time distance between the first time position and a start time position of the first time zone, and the second offset is greater than or equal to 0 and less than a duration of the first time zone.

Further, a second offset satisfies (Q-T-1-T) modR ═ o, where Q is the first time position, T is the first offset, T is the second offset, R is a period of a candidate time position of the first signal, and o is an offset of a candidate time position of the first signal.

and numbering the time slot of the first time position.

Wherein

For the number of slots contained within a frame, see table 1 below.

and numbering the subframe where the first time position is located.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the determining whether to detect the first channel from the first time position according to the detection result of the first signal includes:

determining at least one bit of information bits included in the first signal according to the second offset;

determining whether to detect the first channel starting from the first time position based on the at least one bit.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the first signal includes L information bits, the first time region is formed by P time units, P ≧ L ≧ 1, and P and L are both integers;

wherein the determining at least one bit of the information bits carried by the first signal according to the second offset includes:

determining an i-th information bit from a highest bit among the L information bits according to the second offset,

l is the second offset, P is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to P, L is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to L, and L and P are integers;

wherein said determining whether to detect the first channel starting from the first time position according to the at least one bit comprises:

determining whether to detect the first channel starting from the first time position according to the l-th information bit.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, a period of the candidate time position is the same as a duration of the first time zone.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the first channel is a downlink control channel, and the first time position is a start time position of the discontinuous reception activation time of the terminal device.

In a third aspect, a communication device is provided that includes means for performing the method of the first aspect or any one of the possible implementations of the first aspect.

In a fourth aspect, a communications apparatus is provided that includes a processor. The processor is coupled to the memory and is operable to execute instructions in the memory to implement the method of the first aspect or any of the possible implementations of the first aspect. Optionally, the communication device further comprises a memory. Optionally, the communication device further includes a communication interface, and the processor is coupled to the communication interface and controls the communication interface to implement communication with other network elements.

In one implementation, the communication device is a network device. When the communication device is a network device, the communication interface may be a transceiver, or an input/output interface.

In another implementation, the communication device is a chip configured in the network device. When the communication device is a chip configured in a network device, the communication interface may be an input/output interface.

Alternatively, the transceiver may be a transmit-receive circuit. Alternatively, the input/output interface may be an input/output circuit.

In a fifth aspect, a communication device is provided, which comprises means for performing the method of the second aspect or any one of its possible implementations.

In a sixth aspect, a communications apparatus is provided that includes a processor. The processor is coupled to the memory and is operable to execute the instructions in the memory to implement the method of the second aspect or any of the possible implementations of the second aspect. Optionally, the communication device further comprises a memory. Optionally, the communication device further includes a communication interface, and the processor is coupled to the communication interface and controls the communication interface to implement communication with other network elements.

In one implementation, the communication device is a terminal device. When the communication device is a terminal device, the communication interface may be a transceiver, or an input/output interface.

In another implementation, the communication device is a chip configured in the terminal equipment. When the communication device is a chip configured in a terminal device, the communication interface may be an input/output interface.

In a seventh aspect, a processor is provided, including: input circuit, output circuit and processing circuit. The processing circuit is configured to receive a signal through the input circuit and transmit a signal through the output circuit, so that the processor performs the method of any one of the possible implementations of the first to second aspects and the first to second aspects.

In a specific implementation process, the processor may be a chip, the input circuit may be an input pin, the output circuit may be an output pin, and the processing circuit may be a transistor, a gate circuit, a flip-flop, various logic circuits, and the like. The input signal received by the input circuit may be received and input by, for example and without limitation, a receiver, the signal output by the output circuit may be output to and transmitted by a transmitter, for example and without limitation, and the input circuit and the output circuit may be the same circuit that functions as the input circuit and the output circuit, respectively, at different times. The embodiment of the present application does not limit the specific implementation manner of the processor and various circuits.

In an eighth aspect, a processing apparatus is provided that includes a processor and a memory. The processor is configured to read instructions stored in the memory, and may receive a signal via the receiver and transmit a signal via the transmitter to perform the method of any one of the possible implementations of the first to second aspects and the first to second aspects.

Optionally, the number of the processors is one or more, and the number of the memories is one or more.

Alternatively, the memory may be integral to the processor or provided separately from the processor.

In a specific implementation process, the memory may be a non-transient memory, such as a Read Only Memory (ROM), which may be integrated on the same chip as the processor, or may be separately disposed on different chips.

It will be appreciated that the associated data interaction process, for example, sending the indication information, may be a process of outputting the indication information from the processor, and receiving the capability information may be a process of receiving the input capability information from the processor. In particular, the data output by the processor may be output to a transmitter and the input data received by the processor may be from a receiver. The transmitter and receiver may be collectively referred to as a transceiver, among others.

The processing device in the above eighth aspect may be a chip, the processor may be implemented by hardware or may be implemented by software, and when implemented by hardware, the processor may be a logic circuit, an integrated circuit, or the like; when implemented in software, the processor may be a general-purpose processor implemented by reading software code stored in a memory, which may be integrated with the processor, located external to the processor, or stand-alone.

In a ninth aspect, there is provided a computer program product, the computer program product comprising: a computer program (which may also be referred to as code, or instructions), which when executed, causes a computer to perform the method of any of the possible implementations of the first to second aspects and the first to second aspects described above.

A tenth aspect provides a computer-readable medium storing a computer program (which may also be referred to as code or instructions) which, when run on a computer, causes the computer to perform the method of any one of the possible implementations of the first to second aspects and the first to second aspects described above.

In an eleventh aspect, a communication system is provided, which includes the foregoing network device and terminal device.

According to the communication method of the embodiment of the application, the candidate time positions may be associated with a plurality of first offsets or a plurality of terminal devices, a plurality of first time regions may be determined according to the plurality of first offsets, and when the first time positions of the plurality of terminal devices fall into the respective corresponding first time regions, the first signal corresponding to the first time region may instruct the plurality of terminal devices to start detecting or stop detecting the first channel from the corresponding first time positions, so that even if the periods (i.e., an example of the DRX periods) and the offsets of the candidate time positions of the terminal devices are different, the purpose of multiplexing the same first signal by the plurality of terminal devices can be achieved. That is, the network device does not need to transmit the first signal (i.e., an example of a WUS signal) on different time domain or frequency domain resources for each terminal device, so that resources of the network device can be saved, and the utilization rate of system resources can be improved.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic block diagram of a communication system suitable for use in embodiments of the present application.

Fig. 2 is a schematic diagram of a downlink time-frequency resource grid.

Figure 3 is a diagram of an exemplary DRX cycle.

Figure 4 is an exemplary diagram of DRX cycle time domain locations.

Figure 5 is a diagram of DRX cycle time domain locations of different terminal devices.

Fig. 6 is a schematic diagram of WUS in conjunction with a DRX mechanism.

FIG. 7 is a schematic illustration of a candidate temporal location.

Fig. 8 is a schematic flow chart of a communication method provided herein.

Fig. 9 is a schematic diagram of a positional relationship in the time domain between the first candidate time position, the first offset, and the first time zone.

Fig. 10 is a schematic diagram of a position relationship in the time domain of the first time period, the first candidate time position, and the first time region.

Fig. 11 is a schematic flow chart of a communication method provided herein.

Fig. 12 is a schematic diagram of different terminal devices of the same group detecting the first signal.

Fig. 13 is another schematic diagram of different terminal devices of the same group detecting the first signal.

Fig. 14 is a schematic block diagram of a communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application.

Fig. 15 is a schematic structural diagram of a terminal device according to an embodiment of the present application.

Fig. 16 is a schematic structural diagram of a network device according to an embodiment of the present application.

Detailed Description

The technical solution in the present application will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

The technical scheme of the embodiment of the application can be applied to various communication systems, for example: global system for mobile communications (GSM) systems, Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) systems, Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) systems, General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems, LTE Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) systems, LTE Time Division Duplex (TDD), universal mobile telecommunications system (universal mobile telecommunications system, UMTS), Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) communication systems, future fifth generation (5G) or new radio NR systems, etc.

For the understanding of the embodiments of the present application, a communication system suitable for the embodiments of the present application will be described in detail with reference to fig. 1. Fig. 1 shows a schematic diagram of a communication system suitable for use in embodiments of the present application. As shown in fig. 1, the communication system 100 may include at least one network device, such as the network device 110 shown in fig. 1; the communication system 100 may also include at least one terminal device, such as the terminal device 120 shown in fig. 1. Network device 110 and terminal device 120 may communicate via a wireless link. Each communication device, such as network device 110 or terminal device 120, may be configured with multiple antennas, which may include at least one transmit antenna for transmitting signals and at least one receive antenna for receiving signals. Additionally, each communication device can additionally include a transmitter chain and a receiver chain, each of which can comprise a plurality of components associated with signal transmission and reception (e.g., processors, modulators, multiplexers, demodulators, demultiplexers, antennas, etc.), as will be appreciated by one skilled in the art.

It should be understood that the network device in the wireless communication system may be any device having a wireless transceiving function. Such devices include, but are not limited to: evolved Node B (eNB), Radio Network Controller (RNC), Node B (Node B, NB), Base Station Controller (BSC), Base Transceiver Station (BTS), Home Base Station (e.g., Home evolved NodeB, or Home Node B, HNB), BaseBand Unit (Base band Unit, BBU), Access Point (AP) in Wireless Fidelity (WIFI) system, etc., and may also be 5G, such as NR, gbb in system, or TRP, transmission Point (TRP or TP), one or a group of antennas (including multiple antennas, NB, or a transmission panel) of a Base Station in 5G system, such as a baseband unit (BBU), or a Distributed Unit (DU), etc.

In some deployments, the gNB may include a Centralized Unit (CU) and a DU. The gNB may also include a Radio Unit (RU). A CU implements part of the function of a gNB, and a DU implements part of the function of the gNB, for example, the CU implements the function of a Radio Resource Control (RRC) layer, a Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) layer, and the DU implements the function of a Radio Link Control (RLC) layer, a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer, and a Physical (PHY) layer. Since the information of the RRC layer eventually becomes or is converted from the information of the PHY layer, the higher layer signaling, such as the RRC layer signaling, may also be considered to be transmitted by the DU or the DU + CU under this architecture. It is to be understood that the network device may be a CU node, or a DU node, or a device including a CU node and a DU node. In addition, the CU may be divided into network devices in a Radio Access Network (RAN), or may be divided into network devices in a Core Network (CN), which is not limited in this application.

It should also be understood that terminal equipment in the wireless communication system may also be referred to as User Equipment (UE), an access terminal, a subscriber unit, a subscriber station, a mobile station, a remote terminal, a mobile device, a user terminal, a wireless communication device, a user agent, or a user equipment. The terminal device in the embodiment of the present application may be a mobile phone (mobile phone), a tablet computer (pad), a computer with a wireless transceiving function, a Virtual Reality (VR) terminal device, an Augmented Reality (AR) terminal device, a wireless terminal in industrial control (industrial control), a wireless terminal in self driving (self driving), a wireless terminal in remote medical (remote medical), a wireless terminal in smart grid (smart grid), a wireless terminal in transportation safety (transportation safety), a wireless terminal in smart city (smart city), a wireless terminal in smart home (smart home), and the like. The embodiments of the present application do not limit the application scenarios.

In NR, a basic unit on a frequency domain is one subcarrier, and a subcarrier spacing (SCS) may be 15KHz, 30KHz, etc. In the NR physical layer, the unit of uplink/downlink frequency domain resources is a Physical Resource Block (PRB), and each PRB is composed of 12 consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain. Fig. 2 is a schematic diagram of a downlink time-frequency resource grid.

As shown in fig. 2, each element on the resource grid is referred to as a Resource Element (RE), the RE is the smallest physical resource, and one RE contains one subcarrier in one Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbol. The uplink time-frequency resource grid is similar to the downlink. The basic time unit of downlink resource scheduling in NR is one slot (slot), and in general, one slot is composed of 14 OFDM symbols in time. In the time domain, NR transmissions are organized into frames (frames) of 10ms in time, each frame being divided into 10 equally sized subframes (subframes) of 1ms in length, and each subframe may contain one or more time slots, e.g. one slot per subcarrier spacing, as determined by the subcarrier spacing when the subcarriers are 15 kHz. Each frame is identified by a System Frame Number (SFN), which has a period equal to 1024, and thus repeats itself after 1024 frames.

The number of slots contained within a frame (frame) is related to the size of the subcarrier spacing (SCS), the slot number within the frame

A value range of

Wherein

The number of slots contained within a frame. Taking Cyclic Prefix (CP) as Normal (Normal) cycleFor example, the number of slots included in a frame is shown in table 1:

table 1: slot number contained in one frame

In the table, μ is a value related to the size of the SCS, and the relationship between the value of μ and the size of the SCS is shown in table 2:

table 2: relationship of μ to SCS size Δ f

The network device transmits a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) and a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) to the terminal device. In order to correctly receive the PDSCH, the terminal device needs to demodulate the PDCCH first, and Downlink Control Information (DCI) carried by the PDCCH includes related information required for receiving the PDSCH, such as a PDSCH time-frequency resource location, a time-frequency resource size, multi-antenna configuration information, and the like.

In NR, a terminal device may be in different states, one of which is a radio resource control CONNECTED state (RRC _ CONNECTED). In the RRC _ CONNECTED state, which is mainly used for data transmission by the terminal device, the terminal device has already established a Radio Resource Control (RRC) connection, i.e. parameters necessary for communication between the terminal device and the network device are known to both.

In general, packet-based data streams are typically bursty, with data being transmitted for a period of time, but not for the next longer period of time. Therefore, in the NR, a Discontinuous Reception (DRX) processing procedure may be configured for the terminal device, and when there is no data transmission, power consumption may be reduced by stopping the terminal device from detecting the PDCCH, thereby increasing battery lifetime.

In DRX, the network device may configure a DRX cycle (DRX cycle) for the terminal device in the RRC _ CONNECTED state. Figure 3 shows a typical DRX cycle.

As shown in fig. 3, one DRX cycle may include one "on duration" period (or the first period in this patent). The time period is the length of time of a timer DRX onduration timer, which may be understood as the length of time from the DRX cycle start position, which the terminal device may start in a certain time slot, which is configured by higher layer signaling. In the "on duration" period, the terminal device may detect the PDCCH; if the terminal device does not detect the PDCCH within the "on duration" period, the terminal device may close the receiving circuit to enter a sleep state, thereby reducing power consumption of the terminal.

The DRX cycle selection needs to take into account the balance between power consumption and latency. In one aspect, a long DRX cycle is beneficial for reducing power consumption, but also implies limitations on the network device scheduler, which is not conducive to latency. On the other hand, a shorter DRX cycle facilitates faster response and reduces latency when there is a new data transmission. To meet the above requirements, each terminal device may configure two DRX cycle parameters: DRX-LongCycle (range of 10-10240 ms) and DRX-ShortCycle (range of 2-640 ms), one is a Long DRX cycle (Long DRX cycle) and the other is a Short DRX cycle (Short DRX cycle).

In the RRC _ CONNECTED state, for a terminal device configured with the DRX mechanism, the terminal device may obtain an SFN where a start position of the "on duration" is located and a subframe number of a subframe in the frame according to the following formula (1):

[(SFN×10)+subframe number]mod V＝Y (1)

wherein, V is the period of DRX used by the terminal device, if the terminal device uses a long DRX period, the value of V is DRX-LongCycle, and the value of Y is parameter DRX-StartOffset at this time, and can be configured through high-level signaling, and the unit is 1 ms. If the UE uses a short DRX cycle, then the value of V is DRX-short cycle, and the value of Y is (DRX-StartOffset) module (DRX-short cycle), which can be configured by high layer signaling, and the unit is also 1 ms. The Y value is an offset of DRX, which can be understood as an offset of a starting position of "on duration" (or an initial position of DRX cycle) from a reference point, and is expressed in ms, where a time position f of the reference point satisfies: f mod V ═ 0, where f ═ 10 × n1+ n2, where n1 is the frame number of the reference point, n2 is the subframe number of the reference point, and the start position of the "on duration" is after the reference point time position and the time distance from the reference point is not less than 0 and not more than V-1. Referring to fig. 3, one of the reference points shown in fig. 3 is SFN-0 and subframe number is also 0.

It should be understood that in this patent, the starting position of "on duration" may also be understood as the starting position of the DRX cycle.

It should be understood that the number of the SFN ranges from 0 to 1023 and the subframe number ranges from 0 to 9. . Meanwhile, since the scheduling unit of NR is a timeslot, and for subcarriers larger than 15kHz, one subframe may include multiple timeslots (for example, for 60kHz SCS, one subframe may include 4 timeslots), the high layer signaling configures a parameter drx-slot offset for the terminal device, and the terminal device further determines the timeslot where the start time position of "on duration" is located according to the parameter. The terminal device may start a timer in the determined time slot, the length of the timer (which may be understood as the time length of "on duration") is configured through a high layer signaling, and the terminal device detects the PDCCH within the time range of the timer; and if the terminal equipment does not detect the PDCCH within the time range of the timer, the terminal equipment enters a sleep state after the timer expires. Taking the SCS as 60kHz as an example, see fig. 4, fig. 4 is an example of a DRX cycle time domain position example diagram.

Referring to fig. 5, fig. 5 is a diagram illustrating DRX cycle time domain positions of different terminal devices (assuming that the time domain reference point is SFN ═ 0), in which DRX cycles of two terminal devices (i.e., terminal device #1 and terminal device #2) are both V, but Y values are different (i.e., Y1 ≠ Y2), so time domain positions of "on duration" of the two terminal devices are different. It can be seen that the time domain position of the "on duration" of the terminal device is related to the parameter V, Y or even drx-SlotOffset.

In NR, the terminal device will work in a larger rf and baseband bandwidth, and in a DRX cycle, the terminal device needs to wake up from a sleep state first, start the rf and baseband circuits, acquire time-frequency synchronization, and then detect the PDCCH in "on duration" periods, which require a lot of energy consumption. While data transmission in general tends to be bursty and sparse in time, unnecessary energy consumption is generated for the terminal device if the network device does not have any data scheduling for the terminal device during the active period. So in order to save power consumption, a method of combining a Wake Up Signal (WUS) with a DRX mechanism in an RRC _ CONNECTED state is introduced in the NR.

Fig. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example of a combination of WUS and DRX mechanism. As shown in fig. 6, for a terminal device supporting WUS, for each "on duration" period of a DRX cycle, there is one WUS time (WUS occasion) before its start position, and the distance (i.e., time distance) between the WUS time and the start position of the "on duration" may be referred to as WUS offset (WUS offset) or may also be referred to as gap (gap value). The network device can transmit WUS in DTX mode for the terminal device at WUS time, that is, the network device decides whether to transmit WUS at WUS time according to the requirement of scheduling data, and the terminal device needs to judge whether the network device transmits WUS at WUS time by detecting WUS. When the terminal device does not detect the WUS at the WUS time or the detected WUS indicates that the terminal device has no data scheduling in the corresponding "on duration" period, the terminal device may directly enter a sleep state without detecting the PDCCH in the "on duration" period. When the terminal device detects a WUS at a WUS time, or the detected WUS indicates that the terminal device has data scheduling in an "on duration" period, the terminal device enters an awake state (wake up) from a sleep state, that is, the terminal device can start a timer according to the aforementioned DRX mechanism flow to detect a PDCCH, and at this time, the terminal device needs enough time to start all functions of the modem, so that the terminal device can start detecting the PDCCH from the start position of the "on duration" period and receive a data channel.

In the prior art, for a terminal device configured with a WUS, a network device sends a corresponding WUS according to a DRX cycle, a parameter DRX-StartOffset, a parameter DRX-SlotOffset and a parameter WUS offset used by each terminal device, and a group of terminal devices with the same parameter may share one WUS, that is, the WUS sent at the time of one WUS may be used to indicate whether the group of terminal devices with the same parameter needs to detect a PDCCH during an "on duration" period in the DRX cycle.

There may be many terminal devices in a cell, and the DRX cycle, the parameter DRX-StartOffset, the parameter DRX-SlotOffset, and the parameter WUS offset of the terminal devices may not be all the same, so it is difficult to make the four parameter values of all terminal devices the same, so that the subframes (or slots) in which the "on duration" of the terminal devices is located are generally different. For network devices, if the terminal devices are to wake up, WUS need to be transmitted at many different WUS times, that is, more time-frequency resources are needed to transmit WUS, thereby increasing the consumption and burden of network-side resources.

Therefore, the communication method provides possibility for multiplexing the same WUS for a plurality of terminal devices with at least one different DRX period, parameter DRX-StartOffset and parameter DRX-SlotOffset, thereby being beneficial to saving resources required by network devices for sending the WUS and improving the utilization rate of system resources.

Before specifically describing the method of the present application, first, two concepts of "candidate time position" and "first time position" referred to in the present application will be explained.

The candidate time positions in this application are periodically distributed in the time domain. Referring to fig. 7, fig. 7 is a schematic diagram of a candidate time position.

The network device may transmit the first signal in DTX at the candidate time positions, or may transmit the first signal at the candidate time positions in each period, as described in detail below.

Optionally, the network device may transmit a first signal at the candidate time position to indicate whether the terminal device detects the first channel starting from the corresponding first time position. In this case, the first signal may be a "wake up signal" (WUS) or may be referred to as a "power saving signal" (power saving signal), but the present application is not limited thereto.

If the first signal indicates that the terminal device starts to detect the first channel from the corresponding first time position, the terminal device starts to detect the first channel from the first time position. Illustratively, the terminal device may detect the first channel within a first time period starting from a first time position, where the first time period may be a time length of "on duration", or a time length of a first timer, or a length of an active period of a DRX cycle, or a time zone consisting of K consecutive slots/subframes, where K is not less than 1. That is, the terminal device may detect the first channel during the first time period according to the relevant configuration of the first channel (such as the detection period and the offset value). If the terminal device does not detect the first channel within the first time period, the detection of the first channel may be stopped after the first time period, and simultaneously the receiving or transmitting circuit is turned off to enter a sleep state. If the first signal does not indicate that the terminal device starts detecting the first channel from the first time position, or the first signal indicates that the terminal device does not start detecting the first channel from the first time position, the terminal device may directly enter a sleep state, and the terminal device does not need to detect the first channel in the DRX cycle.

The network device may not transmit the first signal at the candidate time position, and the terminal device does not detect the first signal at the corresponding candidate time position, so that the terminal device does not detect the first channel from the corresponding first time position or does not detect the first channel within the first time period.

Optionally, the network device may transmit a first signal at the candidate time position to indicate whether the terminal device stopped detecting the first channel from the first time position. The first signal may be referred to as a "sleep signal" (GTS) at this time, but the present application is not limited thereto. For example, the terminal device may stop detecting the first signal for a first time period starting from a first time position. The first time period may be a time length of "on duration", or a time length of a first timer, or a length of an active period of a DRX cycle, or a time region composed of K consecutive slots/subframes, or a time length of a DRX cycle, K being not less than 1. And if the first signal indicates that the terminal equipment stops detecting the first channel in the first time period, the terminal equipment stops detecting the first channel in the first time period and continues to enter the sleep state. The terminal device starts detecting the first channel from the first time position if the first signal does not indicate the terminal device to stop detecting the first channel within the first time period or the first signal indicates the terminal device not to stop detecting the first channel within the first time period.

The network device may not transmit the first signal at the candidate time position, and the terminal device does not detect the first signal at the corresponding candidate time position, so that the terminal device does not stop detecting the first channel from the corresponding first time position or does not stop detecting the first channel within the first time period.

In this application, the first channel may be a PDCCH or may also be a data channel PDSCH, which is not limited in this embodiment of the application.

In addition, the first channel may be replaced with a reference signal or other signals for Channel State Information (CSI) measurement or time-frequency tracking/synchronization. The following describes how to determine the candidate temporal position and the first temporal position.

The candidate time locations may be determined based on a period of the candidate time locations and an offset of the candidate time locations. The unit of the period of the candidate time position and the offset of the candidate time position is generally slot, but may also be a subframe (i.e. ms), which is not limited in the embodiment of the present application. The unit of the cycle of the candidate time position is the same as the unit of the offset of the candidate time position. It should be understood that the period of the candidate time locations is the length of time between two adjacent candidate time locations.

By way of example and not limitation, if the unit of the period of the candidate time position and the offset of the candidate time position is slot, and the period of the candidate time position is denoted as R and the offset of the candidate time position is denoted as o, then the frame number n at which the candidate time position is located is_fAnd slot numbering

Satisfies the following formula (2):

wherein,

see table 1 for the number of slots contained in a frame. Offset of candidate time positions can be consideredSolving as the time offset of the candidate time position relative to a reference point, the frame number of the reference point

And slot numbering

Satisfies the following formula (3):

meanwhile, the candidate time position is behind the reference point, and the time distance from the reference point is the offset.

By way of example and not limitation, if the unit of the period of the candidate time position and the offset of the candidate time position is a subframe or ms, the period of the candidate time position is denoted as R, and the offset of the candidate time position is denoted as o, then the frame number n in which the candidate time position is located is_fAnd subframe number n_sfSatisfies the following formula (4):

(n_f*10+n_sf-o)modR＝0 (4)

the offset of the candidate temporal position may be understood as the temporal offset with respect to the reference point at which the frame number of the reference point is located

And subframe number

Satisfies the following formula (5):

In addition, the slot position of the candidate time position in the subframe where it is located may be configured by higher layer signaling.

For the first time position, when the first time position is the starting position corresponding to the DRX cycle, or the starting position corresponding to the "on duration" of the DRX cycle, the first time position may be directly determined according to formula (1), which is not described herein again. If the first time position is the time position of the downlink control channel search space of the terminal device, the first time position can be determined according to the period of the PDCCH search space and the offset value (the unit is slot), and the method is the same as the method for determining the candidate time position, and is not repeated.

Hereinafter, the communication method provided by the present application is described in detail from the perspective of the network device and the terminal device, respectively, in conjunction with the above description of the first time position and the candidate time position.

It should be understood that the manner, the case, the category, and the division of the embodiments are only for convenience of description and should not be construed as a particular limitation, and features in various manners, the category, the case, and the embodiments may be combined without contradiction.

It should also be understood that, in the various embodiments of the present application, the sequence numbers of the processes do not mean the execution sequence, and the execution sequence of the processes should be determined by the functions and the inherent logic of the processes, and should not constitute any limitation to the implementation process of the embodiments of the present application.

It should be further noted that "and/or" describes an association relationship of the associated object, indicating that there may be three relationships, for example, a and/or B, which may indicate: a exists alone, A and B exist simultaneously, and B exists alone. The character "/" generally indicates that the former and latter associated objects are in an "or" relationship. The technical solution provided by the present application will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

It should be understood that the corresponding steps or methods are mainly described herein with the terminal device and the network device as execution subjects, and in practical applications, the execution subjects of the steps or methods may also be a chip applied to the terminal device and a chip applied to the network device.

Fig. 8 is a schematic flow chart of a communication method 200 according to an embodiment of the present application. The method 200 introduces the process of the network device transmitting a first signal at a first candidate time location primarily from the perspective of the network device. Each step of the method 200 is described in detail below.

S210, the network device determines N first time regions according to the first candidate time position, N different first offsets configured for the terminal device group, and the duration of the first time region.

The first candidate time position is any one of a plurality of candidate time positions that are periodically distributed in the time domain. Wherein the plurality of candidate temporal locations are for a group of terminal devices. In other words, the candidate time position corresponding to each first time position of each terminal device in the terminal device group belongs to the plurality of candidate time positions. It should be noted that each terminal device in the terminal device group may not need to detect the first signal at each of the plurality of candidate time positions.

Optionally, the plurality of candidate time positions may also be for a specific terminal device.

Each terminal device of the group of terminal devices is configured with a first time length W, the group of terminal devices comprising at least one (i.e. one or more) terminal device. The first duration is duration of the first time zone. That is, the duration of the first time zone of each terminal device in the terminal device group or the duration of the first time zone corresponding to each terminal device is W. W is a value greater than 1. The unit of W may be ms or slot, but this is not limited in the embodiments of the present application. Optionally, the network device may configure the first duration W for each terminal device through higher layer signaling.

Alternatively, W may be equal to the period of the candidate time locations, such as 10ms or 20ms each, or 10 slots or 20 slots each. At this time, the terminal device may directly obtain the duration of the first time region according to a period of the candidate time position, where the period of the candidate time position may be obtained through a higher layer signaling.

In this application, the network device may configure one of N different first offsets for each terminal device in the terminal device group. The first offsets configured by the network device for different terminal devices in the terminal device group may be the same or different, that is, if the terminal device group includes J terminal devices, N is greater than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to J.

For example, assuming that the terminal device group includes terminal device #1, terminal device #2, and terminal device #3, the network device may configure terminal device #1 with a first offset of T1, terminal device #2 with a first offset of T2, and terminal device #3 with a first offset of T3; alternatively, the network device may configure both terminal device #1 and terminal device #2 with a first offset T1 of T1 and terminal device #3 with a first offset of T3; alternatively, the network device may configure terminal device #1, terminal device #2, and terminal device #3 with the first offset value of T1.

Alternatively, the unit of the first offset may be ms or a subframe or a slot, but this is not limited in this embodiment of the application. The unit of W may be the same as the unit of the first offset amount.

Optionally, the first offset may take a value of 2ms, 3ms, 5ms, 10ms, 20ms, 40ms, 80ms, 160ms, and the like.

Optionally, the network device may configure the first offset for each terminal device according to the capability information of each terminal device in the terminal device group.

For ease of understanding, the terminal apparatus #1 in the terminal apparatus group is explained as an example.

Specifically, the terminal apparatus #1 may report its capability information to the network apparatus, the network apparatus may determine the first offset amount of the terminal apparatus #1 from the capability information reported by the terminal apparatus #1, and may configure the determined first offset amount of the terminal apparatus #1 to the terminal apparatus # 1. The capability information may be a minimum time required for the terminal device #1 to receive a data channel from the detection of the first signal to the detection of the downlink control channel, or a minimum time required for the terminal device to go from a low power state (such as Deep sleep, Light sleep, or Micro sleep power state) to a Non-low power state (such as Non-sleep power state), or a minimum time required for the terminal device to go from a "sleep" state (to turn on only part of the functions of the modem or to use a simple receiving circuit) to turn on all the functions of the modem, and the network device may select a first offset which is closest to the minimum time and is greater than or equal to the minimum time from a plurality of first offsets configured by a higher layer signaling according to the minimum time, and then configure the selected first offset as the first offset of the terminal device # 1.

In this application, the N first time regions determined in S210 correspond to the N first offsets one to one. That is, one first time region can be determined for each first offset.

It should be understood that the N first time regions correspond to first candidate time positions, and that the determined first time regions are different for the candidate time positions in different candidate time position periods.

As an example, for each first offset, the time distance between the start time position of the first time region determined according to the first offset and the first candidate time position is the first offset. That is, the time distance between the start time position of each first time region and the first candidate time position is one of N first offsets, and the time distance between the start time position of each first time region and the first candidate time position is different from each other.

Illustratively, fig. 9 shows a relationship between a first candidate temporal location, a first offset, and a first temporal region. Where T1 is the first offset for terminal #1 and T2 is the first offset for terminal # 2. The first candidate time position is candidate time position # 1. The distance between the start time position of the first time zone #1 (an example of the first time zone) and the candidate time position #1 is T1, and the distance between the start time position of the first time zone #2 (another example of the first time zone) and the first candidate time position is T2.

S220, the network device determines a first time position or a first time period of each terminal device in the terminal device group.

The meaning of the first time position may specifically be as described above, e.g. the first time position may be the start position of the "on duration" of the DRX cycle. Accordingly, the first time position and/or the first time period of each terminal device may be determined by referring to the method described above, which is not described herein again.

S230, the network device transmits a first signal for the terminal device group at the first candidate time position.

The first signal is used for indicating whether the terminal equipment of which the first time position is located in the first time region in the terminal equipment group starts to detect the first channel from the first time position or stops detecting the first channel. In other words, the first signal is used to indicate whether a plurality of terminal devices start to detect the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices, where the at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices is located in a first time zone corresponding to the terminal device. Or, if one or more first time positions of a terminal device are located in a first time region corresponding to the terminal device, the first signal may indicate whether the terminal device starts to detect the first channel from the one or more first time positions or stops detecting the first channel.

Meanwhile, the time distance between the starting time position of the first time region where the first time position of any terminal equipment is located and the first candidate time position is a first offset configured for the terminal equipment.

In order to make the present application better understood by those skilled in the art, the following description will be made by taking as an example whether the first signal is used by the terminal device to detect the first channel from the first time position.

Referring to fig. 10, the first time zone of the terminal apparatus #1 is a first time zone #1, and the first time zone of the terminal apparatus #2 is a first time zone # 2. In the first period of the terminal apparatus #1, only the start position of the first period #11 is located in the first time zone # 1. In the first period of the terminal apparatus #2, only the start position of the first period #21 is located in the second time zone # 2. Then, the first signal may indicate whether the terminal apparatus #1 detects the first channel from the start position of the first period #11 and whether the terminal apparatus #2 detects the first channel from the start position of the first period # 21.

It should be understood that if, in the first time position of the terminal device #1, there are also other first time positions falling in the first time zone #1, the first signal may also indicate whether the terminal device #1 detects the first channel starting from this other first time position falling in the first time zone # 1. It should also be understood that even if a certain first time position of the terminal apparatus #2 falls within the first time zone #1, the first signal cannot indicate whether the terminal apparatus #2 detects the first channel from the first time position.

It should be noted that S230 may or may not be executed.

The first implementation described above is illustrated by taking the position relationship between the first time period and the first time zone shown in fig. 10 as an example.

Specifically, the network device may determine whether the following conditions hold:

condition (1): terminal apparatus #1 needs to detect the first channel from the start position of the first period # 11;

condition (2): terminal apparatus #2 needs to detect the first channel from the start position of the first period # 21.

If one or both of the conditions (1) and (2) are satisfied, the network device may transmit a first signal at a first candidate time position; if neither condition (1) nor condition (2) is true, the network device may not transmit the first signal at the first candidate time position.

The first signal is explained in detail below.

The first signal includes L information bits (or source bits), L ≧ 1, and L is an integer. It should be understood that the information bits are bits that have not been subjected to a channel coding process. The value of L may be specified by a protocol, but this is not limited in this embodiment of the present application, for example, L may also be configured by a network device.

It should be understood that the first signal may carry a total of L information bits, or may carry more information bits than L information bits.

As an example, L may be the number of terminal devices included in the terminal device group in total, and each information bit of the L information bits corresponds to one terminal device in the terminal device group.

For example, the L information bits sequentially correspond to terminal devices identified from large to small in the terminal device group in order from the high order to the low order. For example, L ═ 2, the terminal device group includes terminal device #1 and terminal device #2 in total. The positional relationship of the first time periods of the terminal apparatus #1 and the terminal apparatus #2 with the first time zone is as shown in fig. 10, then when the L information bits are "01", the first signal may indicate that the terminal apparatus #1 needs to detect the first channel from the start position (i.e., the first time position) of the first time period #1, and the terminal apparatus #2 does not need to detect the signal first channel from the start position (i.e., the first time position) of the first time period # 1. Or, conversely, when the L information bits are "01", the first signal may indicate that the terminal apparatus #1 does not need to detect the first channel from the start position of the first period #1, and the terminal apparatus #2 needs to detect the first channel from the start position of the first period # 1.

As another example, at least one information bit of the L information bits corresponds to at least one time unit in each first time region, the at least one information bit being used to indicate whether a terminal device of the at least one terminal device whose first time position is within the at least one time unit detects the first channel from the first time position. This will be described below by taking an example in which the first time zone is constituted by P time units. Wherein, P is more than or equal to L and more than or equal to 1, and P is an integer.

For example, L information bits correspond to P time units in each first time region. Each information bit corresponds to at least one time unit of P time units included in total in each first time region. Wherein the L information bits are used to indicate whether the terminal device whose first time position in the terminal device group is within P time units detects the first channel from the first time position. Or, the L information bits are used to indicate whether a plurality of terminal devices start to detect the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices, where the at least one first time position corresponding to each of the plurality of terminal devices is located in a first time region corresponding to the terminal device.

Or

Wherein,

meaning that the rounding is done down,

In this application, the unit of W and the time unit may be the same, or the granularity of W is one time unit, for example, if W is 10ms or 10 subframes, the first time region may be formed by 10 subframes, but this is not limited in this application.

As yet another example, each of the L information bits corresponds to at least one time unit of P time units included in total in one of the N first time regions.

Or

Or

Or

The first time region corresponding to each of the L information bits may be indicated according to a higher layer signaling configuration or DCI signaling.

For example, when a time unit is a time slot, if P is 10 and L is 10, P is L, and each bit corresponds to one time slot. For another example, if P is 20 and L is 8, each bit may correspond to 2 or 3 slots.

Optionally, the time unit indicated by the L information bit in the L information bits is located at the p time unit in the first time region,

This will be explained with reference to fig. 10. The L information bits correspond to all time units included in the first time zone #11, and the L information bits correspond to all time units included in the first time zone # 21. Each of the L information bits corresponds to at least one time unit of all time units included in the first time zone #11, and each of the L information bits corresponds to at least one time unit of all time units included in the first time zone # 21. Assume that the first time position of the first time period #11 is located at the third time unit within the first time zone #1 and the first time position of the first time period #21 is located at the fourth time unit within the first time zone # 21. If L is 10 and P is 10, the information bit carried by the first signal is "0110100000", then the third bit of the information bits may indicate that terminal device #1 needs to detect the first channel from the start position of the first time period #11, and the fourth bit of the first indication information may indicate that terminal device #2 does not need to detect the first channel from the start position of its first time period # 21. If L is 3 and P is 10, the first signal is "011", then the second bit in the first indication information may indicate that terminal apparatus #1 needs to detect the first channel from the start position of the first time period #11 and that terminal apparatus #2 needs to detect the first channel from the start position of its first time period # 21.

Optionally, as an embodiment of the present application, before the network device sends the first signal, an offset (i.e., a second offset) from a first time position located in a corresponding first time region to the first time region may be first determined, and then an information bit corresponding to the first time position is determined according to the second offset, so as to determine the first signal.

and numbering the time slot of the first time position.

Wherein

For the number of slots contained within a frame, see table 1.

and numbering the subframe where the first time position is located.

In the prior art, for terminal devices with different DRX cycles and offsets (i.e., Y values in formula one), WUS time needs to be configured to transmit WUS, that is, more time-frequency resources are needed to transmit WUS, thereby increasing the consumption and burden of resources on the network side. In the method of the embodiment of the present application, the candidate time positions may be associated with a plurality of first offsets or a plurality of terminal devices, a plurality of first time regions may be determined according to the plurality of first offsets, and when the first time positions of the plurality of terminal devices fall into the respective corresponding first time regions, the first signal corresponding to the first time region may instruct the plurality of terminal devices to start detecting or stop detecting the first channel from the corresponding first time positions, so that even if the cycle (i.e., an example of the DRX cycle) and the offset (i.e., an example of the offset of the active period, which may also be regarded as the Y value in the first formula) of the candidate time positions of the terminal devices are different, the purpose of multiplexing the same first signal by the plurality of terminal devices may be achieved. That is, the network device does not need to transmit the first signal (i.e., an example of a WUS signal) on different time domain or frequency domain resources for each terminal device, so that resources of the network device can be saved, and the utilization rate of system resources can be improved.

Fig. 11 is a schematic flow chart of a communication method 300 according to an embodiment of the present application. The method is used for the terminal equipment to determine a candidate time position corresponding to the first time position and detect the first channel on the determined candidate time position.

For convenience of understanding, the method provided by the present application is described below by taking as an example a process in which the terminal apparatus #1 determines a candidate time position corresponding to the first time position #1 and detects the first channel at the determined candidate time position. It is to be understood that the first time position #1 may be any one of a plurality of first time positions that are periodically distributed. It should also be appreciated that other terminal devices in the terminal device group may determine a candidate time position corresponding to any one of the first time positions and detect the first channel at the determined candidate time position in a similar manner.

S310, the terminal device #1 determines a second offset T according to the first time position #1, the period R of the candidate time position, the first offset T, and the duration W of the first time region. The first time position #1 is located within the first time zone # 1.

It should be understood that terminal device #1 is any one of the terminal device groups described above.

As mentioned above, the first offset T and the duration W of the first time zone may be configured by the network device, and are not described herein again. The period R of the candidate time positions may be notified to the terminal device #1 by the network device, such as by higher layer signaling. Further, the network device may also notify the terminal device #1 of the offset o of the candidate time position, such as by higher layer signaling.

Alternatively, the value of W may be equal to the value of R.

As described above, the first time position #1 of the terminal apparatus #1 may be determined according to formula (1) or according to the period of the PDCCH search space and the offset value (in slots), which is not described herein again.

Optionally, the second offset t is a time distance between the first time position #1 and a start position of the first time zone #1 corresponding to the first time position #1, and the second offset is greater than or equal to 0 and less than a duration of the first time zone. The unit of the second offset may be ms, or the granularity of the second offset may be a subframe or a slot, but the embodiment of the present application is not limited thereto.

Further, the second offset satisfies (Q-T-1-T) modR ═ o or (Q-T) modR ═ o, where Q is the first time position # 1. Wherein the value range of t is as follows: t is more than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to W-1 or t is more than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to W.

and numbering the time slot of the first time position.

Wherein

For the number of slots contained within a frame, see table 1.

and numbering the subframe where the first time position is located.

S320, the terminal apparatus #1 detects the first signal at the first candidate time position.

S330, the terminal apparatus #1 determines whether to start detecting or stop detecting the first channel from the first time position #1 according to the detection result of the first signal.

Specifically, if the terminal apparatus #1 detects the first signal at the first candidate time position, the terminal apparatus #1 may determine whether to start or stop detecting the first channel from the first time position #1 based on the first signal. If the terminal apparatus #1 does not detect the first signal at the first candidate time position, the terminal apparatus #1 does not start detecting or stop detecting the first channel from the first time position # 1.

Optionally, as an embodiment of the present application, S930 may specifically be: the terminal apparatus #1 determines at least one bit of information bits included in the first signal according to the second offset t, and then determines whether to detect the first channel from the first time position #1 according to the at least one bit.

As described earlier, the first signal may include L information bits, and the first time region #1 is composed of P time units, to which the L information bits correspond. In this case, the terminal apparatus #1 determines the first signal according to the second offset t, including: the terminal device #1 determines a time unit of the P time units in which the first time position #1 is located according to the second offset t and the duration W of the first time region, and determines whether to start detecting the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from the first time position #1 according to an indication of an information bit corresponding to the time unit corresponding to the first time position #1 in the L information bits.

In short, the terminal apparatus #1 needs to determine which time unit of the P time units the first time position #1 corresponds to, and then determine whether to start detecting the first channel from the first time position #1 or stop detecting the first channel according to the information bit corresponding to the determined time unit.

Optionally, the time unit corresponding to the first time position #1 is the P-th time unit of the P time units, the granularity of the duration of the first time region and the granularity of the second offset t are 1 time unit, and P is equal to t, and 1 is equal to or less than P.

For example, if W is 10ms and a time unit is a subframe, P is 10, and if t is 2 subframes, the time unit corresponding to the first time position may be determined to be the second time unit of the 10 time units.

Further, the information bit corresponding to the t-th time unit is the L-th information bit from the highest bit among the L information bits, wherein, then

Then, the terminal apparatus #1 can determine the l-th information bit after determining p, so that it can determine whether to start detecting the first channel or stop detecting the first channel from the first time position # 1. For example, when the l-th information bit is "1", the terminal apparatus #1 may determine that the first channel needs to be detected from the first time position #1, and when the l-th information bit is "0", the terminal apparatus #1 may determine that the first channel does not need to be detected from the first time position # 1. Or conversely, when the l-th information bit is "0", the terminal apparatus #1 may determine that the first channel needs to be detected from the first time position #1, and when the l-th information bit is "1", the terminal apparatus #1 may determine that the first channel does not need to be detected from the first time position # 1.

Optionally, the method may further include: the terminal device #1 determines the first time zone #1 in which the first transition period is located, based on the second offset t and the duration W of the first time zone.

Optionally, a time distance between the start position of the first time zone #1 where the first time position is located and the first candidate time position is the first offset T.

Optionally, the second offset t is a time distance between a start position of the first conversion period and a start time position of the first time zone #1, and the second offset is greater than or equal to 0 and less than a duration of the first time zone.

The method provided by the present application is mainly described above from the perspective of one terminal device, and a specific example of detecting the first signal by different terminal devices in the same group is given below with reference to fig. 12 and 13, taking the first time position as the starting slot of the "on duration" in the DRX cycle as an example.

As shown in fig. 12, it is assumed that DRX cycles of 3 terminal apparatuses (i.e., terminal apparatus #1, terminal apparatus #2, and terminal apparatus #3) in the same group are 16ms, 20ms, and 8ms, respectively, first offsets are all T ═ 40ms, the length of the first time zone is 8ms, and the offset of the candidate time position is 7 ms. Fig. 12 shows the first signals that three terminal devices need to detect from the perspective of the terminal device. For terminal apparatus #1, the "on duration" starting positions in the two DRX cycles are both at a distance T + T-40 + 3-43 (ms) from the first signal shared by the remaining two terminal apparatuses. For terminal apparatus #2, the distance between the "on duration" start position in the three DRX cycles and the corresponding first signal is T + T3-40 + 4-44 (ms). For the "on duration" start position of terminal device #2, if the distance between its "on duration" start position and the first signal shared by the two remaining terminal devices is T + T-40 + 1-41 (ms) for one DRX cycle of the terminal device; then for the next DRX cycle of this terminal device, the distance of its "on duration" starting position from the candidate time position shared by the remaining two terminal devices becomes T + T-40 + 5-45 (ms), due to the influence of the DRX cycle of terminal device # 2. That is, in order to enable a group of terminal devices with different DRX parameters (including DRX cycle and offset of "on duration") to multiplex the same first signal, the distance of the terminal device "on duration" start position from the candidate time position may be dynamically changed, possibly differently for different DRX cycles. For the terminal device, the candidate time position for detecting the first signal is determined according to the DRX cycle and the duration of the first time region.

As shown in fig. 13, terminal apparatus #1, terminal apparatus #2, and terminal apparatus #3 share the same first signal, which carries source information of L ═ 10 bits. According to the second offset of the 3 terminal devices, the 3 rd, 5th and 9 th bits of the information source information bit corresponding to the 3 terminal devices can be obtained; if the source bit value is "0110100000", this means that terminal apparatus #1 and terminal apparatus #2 need to detect the first channel from the corresponding "on duration" start positions, and terminal apparatus #3 continues to enter the sleep state.

If the first signal only carries 1-bit information or energy detection, the terminal device can determine that the first channel needs to be detected from the corresponding "on duration" starting position if the terminal device detects the first signal at the candidate time position; if the terminal device does not detect the first signal, the terminal device continues to enter the sleep state.

The method provided by the embodiment of the present application is described in detail above with reference to fig. 2 to 13. Hereinafter, the apparatus provided in the embodiment of the present application will be described in detail with reference to fig. 14 to 16.

Fig. 14 is a schematic block diagram of a communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application. As shown in fig. 14, the communication device 400 may include a processing unit 410 and a transceiving unit 420.

In one possible design, the communication apparatus 400 may correspond to the network device in the above method embodiment, and may be, for example, a network device or a chip configured in a network device.

Specifically, the communication apparatus 400 may correspond to the network device in the method 200 according to the embodiment of the present application, and the communication apparatus 400 may include a unit for executing the method executed by the network device in the method 200 in fig. 8. Also, the units and other operations and/or functions described above in the communication apparatus 400 are respectively for implementing the corresponding flows of the method 200 in fig. 8. When the communication device 400 is configured to perform the method 200 in fig. 8, the processing unit 410 is configured to perform the steps S210 and S220 in the method 200, and the transceiver unit 420 is configured to perform the step S230 in the method 200.

It should be understood that the specific processes of the units for executing the corresponding steps are already described in detail in the above method embodiments, and therefore, for brevity, detailed descriptions thereof are omitted.

It is also understood that the processing unit 410 in the communication apparatus 400 may correspond to the processor 610 in the network device 600 shown in fig. 16, and the transceiving unit 420 may correspond to the transceiver 620 in the network device 600 shown in fig. 16.

In another possible design, the communication apparatus 400 may correspond to the terminal device in the above method embodiment, and may be the terminal device or a chip configured in the terminal device, for example.

Specifically, the communication apparatus 400 may correspond to the terminal device in the method 300 according to the embodiment of the present application, and the communication apparatus 400 may include a unit for executing the method executed by the terminal device in the method 300 in fig. 11. Also, the units and other operations and/or functions described above in the communication apparatus 400 are respectively for implementing the corresponding flows of the method 300 in fig. 11. When the communication device 400 is configured to perform the method 300 in fig. 11, the processing unit 410 is configured to perform steps S310 and S330 in the method 300, and the transceiver unit 420 is configured to perform step S320 in the method 300. Alternatively, step S320 may be performed by the processing unit 410.

It is also understood that the processing unit 410 in the communication apparatus 400 may correspond to the processor 501 in the terminal device 500 shown in fig. 15, and the transceiving unit 420 may correspond to the transceiver 502 in the terminal device 500 shown in fig. 15.

Fig. 15 is a schematic structural diagram of a terminal device 500 according to an embodiment of the present application. As shown, the terminal device 500 includes a processor 501 and a transceiver 502. Optionally, the terminal device 500 further comprises a memory 503. The processor 501, the transceiver 502 and the memory 503 can communicate with each other via the internal connection path to transmit control and/or data signals, the memory 503 is used for storing a computer program, and the processor 501 is used for calling and running the computer program from the memory 503 to control the transceiver 502 to transmit and receive signals. Optionally, the terminal device 500 may further include an antenna 504, configured to send uplink data or uplink control signaling output by the transceiver 502 by using a wireless signal.

The processor 501 and the memory 503 may be combined into a processing device, and the processor 501 is configured to execute the program codes stored in the memory 503 to implement the functions. It should be understood that the processing devices shown in the figures are examples only. In particular implementations, the memory 503 may also be integrated into the processor 501 or may be separate from the processor 501. This is not limited in this application.

The terminal device 500 further includes an antenna 510 for transmitting the uplink data or the uplink control signaling output by the transceiver 502 through a wireless signal.

When the program instructions stored in the memory 503 are executed by the processor 501, the processor 501 is configured to determine a second offset based on a first time position, a period of a candidate time position of the first signal, a first offset allocated to the terminal device, and a duration of a first time region within which the first time position is located; the processing unit is further configured to determine a first candidate time position from a plurality of candidate time positions of the first signal according to the first time position, the first offset, and the second offset, where the plurality of candidate time positions are periodically distributed in a time domain according to a period of the candidate time position; detecting the first signal at the first candidate temporal location; the processing unit is further configured to determine whether to detect a first channel from the first time position according to a detection result of the first signal. Or "detecting the first signal at the first candidate time position" may be performed by the transceiver 502.

Specifically, the terminal device 500 may correspond to the terminal device in the method 300 according to the embodiment of the present application, and the terminal device 500 may include a unit for executing the method executed by the terminal device in the method 300 in fig. 11. Also, the units in the terminal device 500 and the other operations and/or functions described above are respectively for implementing the corresponding flows of the method 300 in fig. 11. The processor 501 may be configured to perform the actions described in the foregoing method embodiments, which are implemented by the terminal device, and the transceiver 502 may be configured to perform the actions described in the foregoing method embodiments, which are transmitted to or received from the network device by the terminal device. Please refer to the description of the previous embodiment of the method, which is not repeated herein.

Optionally, the terminal device 500 may further include a power supply 506 for supplying power to various devices or circuits in the terminal device.

In addition, in order to further improve the functions of the terminal device, the terminal device 500 may further include one or more of an input unit 505, a display unit 507, an audio circuit 508, a camera 509, a sensor 511, and the like, and the audio circuit may further include a speaker 5082, a microphone 5084, and the like.

Fig. 16 is a schematic structural diagram of a network device 600 according to an embodiment of the present application. As shown, the network device 600 includes a processor 610 and a transceiver 620. Optionally, the network device 600 further comprises a memory 630. Wherein, the processor 610, the transceiver 620 and the memory 630 are communicated with each other via the internal connection path to transmit control and/or data signals, the memory 630 is used for storing a computer program, and the processor 610 is used for calling and running the computer program from the memory 630 to control the transceiver 620 to transmit and receive signals.

The processor 610 and the memory 630 may be combined into a single processing device, and the processor 610 is configured to execute the program codes stored in the memory 630 to implement the functions described above. In particular implementations, the memory 630 may be integrated with the processor 610 or may be separate from the processor 610.

The network device 600 may further include an antenna 640, configured to send the downlink data or the downlink control signaling output by the transceiver 620 through a wireless signal.

When the program instructions stored in the memory 630 are executed by the processor 610, the processor 610 is configured to determine a second offset based on a first time location, a period of a candidate time location of the first signal, a first offset configured to the terminal device, and a duration of a first time region within which the first time location is located; the processing unit is further configured to determine a first candidate time position from a plurality of candidate time positions of the first signal according to the first time position, the first offset, and the second offset, where the plurality of candidate time positions are periodically distributed in a time domain according to a period of the candidate time position; detecting the first signal at the first candidate temporal location; the processing unit is further configured to determine whether to detect a first channel from the first time position according to a detection result of the first signal. Or "detecting the first signal at the first candidate time position" may be performed by transceiver 620.

Specifically, the network device 600 may correspond to the network device in the method 200 according to the embodiment of the present application, and the network device 600 may include a unit for executing the method executed by the network device in the method 200 in fig. 8. Moreover, each unit and the other operations and/or functions in the network device 600 are respectively for implementing the corresponding flow of the method 200 in fig. 8, and a specific process of each unit for executing the corresponding step has been described in detail in the above method embodiment, and is not described herein again for brevity.

The processor 610 may be configured to perform the actions described in the previous method embodiments that are implemented inside the network device, and the transceiver 620 may be configured to perform the actions described in the previous method embodiments that the network device transmits to or receives from the terminal device. Please refer to the description of the previous embodiment of the method, which is not repeated herein.

It should be understood that the processor in the embodiments of the present application may be a Central Processing Unit (CPU), and the processor may also be other general-purpose processors, Digital Signal Processors (DSPs), Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs), Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) or other programmable logic devices, discrete gate or transistor logic devices, discrete hardware components, and the like.

It will also be appreciated that the memory in the embodiments of the subject application can be either volatile memory or nonvolatile memory, or can include both volatile and nonvolatile memory. The non-volatile memory may be a read-only memory (ROM), a Programmable ROM (PROM), an Erasable PROM (EPROM), an Electrically Erasable PROM (EEPROM), or a flash memory. Volatile memory can be Random Access Memory (RAM), which acts as external cache memory. By way of example, but not limitation, many forms of Random Access Memory (RAM) are available, such as Static RAM (SRAM), Dynamic RAM (DRAM), Synchronous DRAM (SDRAM), double data rate SDRAM (DDR SDRAM), Enhanced SDRAM (ESDRAM), synchlink DRAM (SLDRAM), and direct bus RAM (DR RAM).

According to the method provided by the embodiment of the present application, the present application further provides a computer program product, which includes: computer program code which, when run on a computer, causes the computer to perform the method in the embodiment shown in fig. 8 or fig. 11.

According to the method provided by the embodiment of the present application, the present application also provides a computer readable medium storing program code, which when run on a computer, causes the computer to execute the method in the embodiment shown in fig. 8 or fig. 11.

According to the method provided by the embodiment of the present application, the present application further provides a system, which includes the foregoing one or more terminal devices and one or more network devices.

The above embodiments may be implemented in whole or in part by software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof. When implemented in software, the above-described embodiments may be implemented in whole or in part in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product includes one or more computer instructions. When loaded or executed on a computer, cause the flow or functions according to embodiments of the invention to occur, in whole or in part. The computer may be a general purpose computer, a special purpose computer, a network of computers, or other programmable device. The computer instructions may be stored on a computer readable storage medium or transmitted from one computer readable storage medium to another computer readable storage medium, for example, the computer instructions may be transmitted from one website, computer, server, or data center to another website, computer, server, or data center by wire (e.g., infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.). The computer-readable storage medium can be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer or a data storage device such as a server, data center, etc. that contains one or more collections of available media. The usable medium may be a magnetic medium (e.g., floppy disk, hard disk, magnetic tape), an optical medium (e.g., Digital Versatile Disk (DVD)), or a semiconductor medium. The semiconductor medium may be a solid state disk.

Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the various illustrative elements and algorithm steps described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented as electronic hardware or combinations of computer software and electronic hardware. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware or software depends upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the implementation. Skilled artisans may implement the described functionality in varying ways for each particular application, but such implementation decisions should not be interpreted as causing a departure from the scope of the present application.

It is clear to those skilled in the art that, for convenience and brevity of description, the specific working processes of the above-described systems, apparatuses and units may refer to the corresponding processes in the foregoing method embodiments, and are not described herein again.

It should be understood that "and/or" in the present application, describing an association relationship of associated objects, means that there may be three relationships, for example, a and/or B, may mean: a exists alone, A and B exist simultaneously, and B exists alone. The character "/" generally indicates that the former and latter associated objects are in an "or" relationship. "at least one" means one or more than one; "at least one of a and B", similar to "a and/or B", describes an association relationship of associated objects, meaning that three relationships may exist, for example, at least one of a and B may mean: a exists alone, A and B exist simultaneously, and B exists alone.

In the several embodiments provided in the present application, it should be understood that the disclosed system, apparatus and method may be implemented in other ways. For example, the above-described apparatus embodiments are merely illustrative, and for example, the division of the units is only one logical division, and other divisions may be realized in practice, for example, a plurality of units or components may be combined or integrated into another system, or some features may be omitted, or not executed. In addition, the shown or discussed mutual coupling or direct coupling or communication connection may be an indirect coupling or communication connection through some interfaces, devices or units, and may be in an electrical, mechanical or other form.

The units described as separate parts may or may not be physically separate, and parts displayed as units may or may not be physical units, may be located in one place, or may be distributed on a plurality of network units. Some or all of the units can be selected according to actual needs to achieve the purpose of the solution of the embodiment.

In addition, functional units in the embodiments of the present application may be integrated into one processing unit, or each unit may exist alone physically, or two or more units are integrated into one unit.

The functions, if implemented in the form of software functional units and sold or used as a stand-alone product, may be stored in a computer readable storage medium. Based on such understanding, the technical solution of the present application or portions thereof that substantially contribute to the prior art may be embodied in the form of a software product stored in a storage medium and including instructions for causing a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device) to execute all or part of the steps of the method according to the embodiments of the present application. And the aforementioned storage medium includes: various media capable of storing program codes, such as a usb disk, a removable hard disk, a read-only memory (ROM), a Random Access Memory (RAM), a magnetic disk, or an optical disk.

The above description is only for the specific embodiments of the present application, but the scope of the present application is not limited thereto, and any person skilled in the art can easily conceive of the changes or substitutions within the technical scope of the present application, and shall be covered by the scope of the present application. Therefore, the protection scope of the present application shall be subject to the protection scope of the claims.

Claims

1. A method of communication, comprising:

respectively determining N first time regions according to a first candidate time position, the duration of the first time region and N first offsets configured for at least one terminal device, wherein the first candidate time position is any candidate time position in a plurality of candidate time positions, the candidate time positions are periodically distributed in a time domain, the N first offsets are different, N is an integer greater than or equal to 1, and each terminal device in the at least one terminal device is configured with one first offset of the N different first offsets;

determining a first time position of each terminal device;

2. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one bit of the information bits carried by the first signal corresponds to at least one time unit in each first time region, and wherein the at least one bit is used to indicate whether a terminal device of the at least one terminal device having a first time position within the at least one time unit detects the first channel from the first time position.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the first signal comprises L information bits, wherein the first time region comprises P time units, and wherein each bit corresponds to a time unit of the number

Or

And P is more than or equal to L and more than or equal to 1, and each bit is used for indicating whether the terminal equipment of which the first time position is located in the time unit corresponding to the bit in the at least one terminal equipment detects the first channel from the first time position.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the time unit indicated by the I-th bit of the L information bits is located on the p-th time unit in a first time region,

p is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to P, L is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to L, and both P and L are integers.

5. The method according to any of claims 1 to 4, characterized in that for each first offset, the time distance between the starting time position of the first time region determined according to the first offset and the first candidate time position is the first offset.

6. The method according to any of claims 1 to 4, wherein a time distance between a starting time position of a first time zone in which a first time position of the terminal device is located and the first candidate time position is a first offset configured by the terminal device.

7. The method of any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the period of the plurality of candidate time locations is equal to the duration of the first time region.

8. The method according to any of claims 1 to 4, characterized in that for each terminal device, the time distance between the first time position of the terminal device and the first candidate time position is the sum of a first offset configured to the terminal device and a second offset of the terminal device, the second offset being greater than or equal to 0 and smaller than the duration of the first time zone.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein for each terminal device, the second offset for the terminal device satisfies (Q-T-1-T) mod R ═ o, where Q is the first time location of the terminal device, T is the first offset configured for the terminal device, T is the second offset for the terminal device, R is the period of the candidate time locations, and o is the offset of the candidate time locations.

10. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the first channel is a downlink control channel, and the first time position is a start time position of a discontinuous reception activation time of the terminal device.

11. A method of communication, comprising:

detecting the first signal at the first candidate temporal location;

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

13. The method of claim 12, wherein a temporal distance between a starting location of a first time zone in which the first time location is located and the first candidate time location is the first offset.

14. The method according to any one of claims 11 to 13, wherein a temporal distance between the first candidate temporal position and the first temporal position is a sum of the first offset and the second offset.

15. The method of any of claims 11 to 13, the second offset being a time distance between the first time position and the first time zone start time position, the second offset being greater than or equal to 0 and less than a duration of the first time zone.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the second offset satisfies (Q-T-1-T) mod R ═ o, where Q is the first time position, T is the first offset, T is the second offset, R is a period of a candidate time position of the first signal, and o is an offset of a candidate time position of the first signal.

17. The method according to any one of claims 11 to 13, wherein determining whether to detect the first channel from the first time position according to the detection result of the first signal comprises:

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the first signal comprises L information bits, wherein the first time region consists of P time units, wherein P ≧ L ≧ 1, and both P and L are integers;

l is the second offset, p is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal toP, L is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to L, and L and P are integers;

19. The method according to any one of claims 11 to 13, wherein the period of the candidate time locations is the same as the duration of the first time zone.

20. The method according to any of claims 11 to 13, wherein the first channel is a downlink control channel, and the first time position is a start time position of the discontinuous reception activation time of the terminal device.

21. A communications apparatus, comprising:

a processing unit, configured to determine N first time regions respectively according to a first candidate time position, a duration of the first time region, and N first offsets configured for at least one terminal device, where the first candidate time position is any candidate time position in multiple candidate time positions, the multiple candidate time positions are periodically distributed in a time domain, the N first offsets are different from each other, N is an integer greater than or equal to 1, and each terminal device in the at least one terminal device configures one first offset in the N different first offsets;

the processing unit is further configured to determine a first time location of each terminal device;

a transceiver unit, configured to transmit a first signal for the at least one terminal device at the first candidate time position, where the first signal is used to indicate whether a terminal device whose first time position is within the first time region in the at least one terminal device detects a first channel from the first time position.

22. The apparatus of claim 21, wherein at least one bit of the information bits carried by the first signal corresponds to at least one time unit in each first time region, and wherein the at least one bit is used to indicate whether a terminal device with a first time position in the at least one time unit in the at least one terminal device detects the first channel from the first time position.

23. The apparatus of claim 22, wherein the first signal comprises L information bits, wherein the first time region comprises P time units, and wherein each bit corresponds to a time unit with a number of time units

Or

24. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the time unit indicated by the I-th bit of the L information bits is located on the p-th time unit in a first time region,

p and L are integers, P is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to P, and L is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to L.

25. The apparatus according to any of claims 21 to 24, wherein for each first offset, a time distance between a starting time position of a first time region determined from the first offset and the first candidate time position is the first offset.

26. The apparatus according to any of claims 21 to 24, wherein a time distance between a starting time position of a first time zone in which a first time position of the terminal device is located and the first candidate time position is a first offset configured by the terminal device.

27. The apparatus of any one of claims 21 to 24, wherein a period of the plurality of candidate time locations is equal to a duration of the first time region.

28. The apparatus according to any of claims 21 to 24, wherein for each terminal device, a time distance between the first time position of the terminal device and the first candidate time position is a sum of a first offset configured to the terminal device and a second offset of the terminal device, the second offset being greater than or equal to 0 and smaller than a duration of the first time zone.

29. The apparatus of claim 28, wherein for each terminal device, the second offset for the terminal device satisfies (Q-T-1-T) mod R ═ o, where Q is a first time position for the terminal device, T is the first offset configured for the terminal device, T is the second offset for the terminal device, R is a period of the candidate time positions, and o is an offset for the candidate time positions.

30. The apparatus according to any one of claims 21 to 24, wherein the first channel is a downlink control channel, and the first time position is a start time position of a discontinuous reception activation time of the terminal device.

31. A communications apparatus, comprising:

a processing unit, configured to determine a second offset according to a first time position, a period of a candidate time position of a first signal, a first offset configured to a terminal device, and a duration of a first time zone, where the first time position is located in the first time zone;

the processing unit is further configured to determine a first candidate time position from a plurality of candidate time positions of the first signal according to the first time position, the first offset, and the second offset, where the plurality of candidate time positions are periodically distributed in a time domain according to a period of the candidate time position;

a transceiver unit configured to detect the first signal at the first candidate time position;

the processing unit is further configured to determine whether to detect a first channel from the first time position according to a detection result of the first signal.

32. The apparatus of claim 31, wherein the processing unit is further configured to:

33. The apparatus of claim 32, wherein a temporal distance between a starting location of a first time zone in which the first time location is located and the first candidate time location is the first offset.

34. The apparatus of any one of claims 31-33, wherein a temporal distance between the first candidate temporal location and the first temporal location is a sum of the first offset and the second offset.

35. The apparatus of any of claims 31-33, the second offset being a time distance between the first time position and the first time zone start time position, the second offset being greater than or equal to 0 and less than a duration of the first time zone.

36. The apparatus of claim 34, wherein the second offset satisfies (Q-T-1-T) mod R ═ o, where Q is the first time position, T is the first offset, T is the second offset, R is a period of a candidate time position of the first signal, and o is an offset of a candidate time position of the first signal.

37. The apparatus according to any one of claims 31 to 33, wherein the processing unit is specifically configured to:

38. The apparatus of claim 37, wherein the first signal comprises L information bits, the first time region is composed of P time units, P ≧ L ≧ 1, and P and L are both integers;

wherein the processing unit is specifically configured to:

39. The apparatus of any one of claims 31 to 33, wherein the period of the candidate time locations is the same as the duration of the first time region.

40. The apparatus according to any one of claims 31 to 33, wherein the first channel is a downlink control channel, and the first time position is a start time position of the discontinuous reception activation time of the terminal device.

41. A computer-readable medium, comprising a computer program which, when run on a computer, causes the computer to perform the method of any one of claims 1 to 20.

42. A communication apparatus, comprising a processor and a storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the method according to any one of claims 1 to 20 to be implemented.