CN111865370A

CN111865370A - Method, device and system for determining arrival angle of signal

Info

Publication number: CN111865370A
Application number: CN201910364303.4A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 王旭东; 翟邦昭; 唐爱民; 戴明增; 卓义斌
Original assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2019-04-30
Filing date: 2019-04-30
Publication date: 2020-10-30

Abstract

The embodiment of the application provides a method, a device and a system for determining a signal arrival angle, relates to the technical field of communication, and aims to improve the efficiency of beam training by accurately calculating the signal arrival angle. The method comprises the following steps: the receiving equipment sequentially switches a plurality of receiving wave beams to receive the reference signals which are sent by the sending equipment on the reference signal resources and are the same for a plurality of times, and a plurality of received signals are obtained; the beam directions of the multiple receiving beams are different, and the beam directions of the multiple receiving beams correspond to the multiple reference signals one by one; the receiving equipment performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain received signal matrixes corresponding to the multiple received signals; the receiving equipment performs beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix; and the receiving equipment determines the signal arrival angle of the transmitting equipment according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm.

Description

Method, device and system for determining arrival angle of signal

Technical Field

The embodiment of the application relates to the technical field of communication, in particular to a method, a device and a system for determining a signal arrival angle.

Background

As the demand for wireless communications continues to increase, more spectrum resources are divided for wireless communications. Millimeter wave bands (30 GHz-300 GHz) provide continuous bandwidth resources up to several GHz, and have been adopted by the standards for wireless local area networks and wireless personal area networks such as IEEE 802.11 ad. The third Generation partnership Project (3 GPP) standard also started to support mm-wave communication in Release 15 (R15), marking mm-wave communication as one of the key technologies in the fifth Generation (5-Generation, 5G) mobile communication system. In view of the high frequency and short wavelength of millimeter wave signals, they experience severe path loss when propagating in air. In order to overcome the millimeter wave path loss, a beam forming technology based on an array antenna is required to concentrate signal energy in a specific direction, so that the antenna gain in the direction is improved.

In the prior art, beam training can be realized in the following manner, and training beams with different widths are supported to be formed by designing a multi-stage beam forming codebook. In performing beam training, as shown in (a) of fig. 1, the terminal and the base station perform beam scanning using a wide beam with each other, determine a coarse beam direction from the received signal strength, and reduce the search space range. Then, as shown in (b) of fig. 1, the terminal performs beam scanning in the search space after the reduction by the narrow beam, and determines the beam pointing direction again from the received signal strength. Finally, the base station performs beam scanning within the search space determined by the terminal using narrow beams as shown in (c) of fig. 1, and finally determines an accurate beam pointing direction according to the received signal strength.

However, the design of the multilevel codebook requires that the array antenna has a plurality of Radio Frequency (RF) links (Chain) connecting the radio frequency front end and the baseband, but because the radio frequency links have large power consumption and high implementation cost, generally in a millimeter wave communication system, the number of the radio frequency links is limited, and it is difficult to form the multilevel codebook and the corresponding antenna gain directional diagram which meet the requirements; secondly, the multi-level codebook method judges the beam direction according to the strength of the received signal, and the accuracy of the estimation of the arrival angle of the signal and the resolving power of the multipath are limited by the beam width.

Disclosure of Invention

The embodiment of the application provides a method, a device and a system for determining a signal arrival angle, which are used for improving the efficiency of beam training by accurately calculating the signal arrival angle.

In order to achieve the above purpose, the embodiments of the present application provide the following technical solutions:

in a first aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal, including: the receiving device sequentially switches a plurality of receiving wave beams to receive the same reference signals which are sent by the sending device on the reference signal resource for a plurality of times, and obtains a plurality of received signals. The beam directions of the plurality of reception beams are different, and the beam directions of the plurality of reception beams correspond to the multiple reference signals one to one. The receiving equipment performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals. The receiving device performs beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix. And the receiving equipment determines the signal arrival angle of the transmitting equipment according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm.

In the method for determining the angle of arrival of a signal provided in the embodiment of the present application, a receiving device receives multiple identical reference signals sent by a sending device on a reference signal resource by sequentially switching multiple receiving beams to obtain multiple received signals, and estimation of the angle of arrival of the signal does not depend on fine scanning of the beams, so that when the receiving device detects the multiple reference signals sent by the sending device, the receiving device does not need to perform fine beam scanning, and coarse beam scanning can be achieved by sequentially switching the multiple receiving beams. Then, the arrival angle of the signal can be estimated by means of digital signal processing and a preset algorithm. Therefore, the beam training overhead can be greatly reduced, the rapid beam training is realized, the reliability and the stability of the millimeter wave communication system are improved, and the finer topology management, the routing calculation and the mobility management are facilitated. In addition, the method provided by the embodiment of the present application not only determines the optimal beam pointing direction depending on the received signal strength, but also estimates AoA by performing digital signal processing on multiple received signals, so that not only can higher precision be obtained than a beam training method based on the received signal strength, but also fine beam scanning is not required, thereby achieving fast and accurate beam training performance.

In one possible implementation manner, a receiving device performs digital signal processing on multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals, including: the receiving device determines at least one receive beam from the plurality of receive beams based on the signal parameters of the plurality of receive beams. The receiving device determines at least one receiving signal corresponding to at least one receiving beam according to the at least one receiving beam. The receiving device performs digital signal processing on at least one received signal and determines a received signal matrix corresponding to the at least one received signal as a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals. This allows digital signal processing to be performed on at least one received signal that meets the requirements, reducing computational complexity.

In one possible implementation, the at least one receiving beam is a receiving beam of the plurality of receiving beams, where the signal energy is greater than or equal to an energy threshold.

In one possible implementation, the beam directions of the multiple receive beams are determined by a switched beam codebook, the switched beam codebook includes one or more columns of beamforming vectors, each column of beamforming vectors in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors corresponds to one set of phase shift values of the phase shifter, and each column of beamforming vectors is used to determine the beam direction of one receive beam. Therefore, the receiving equipment can switch the receiving beam in sequence according to the switched beam codebook to receive the reference signals sent by a plurality of different sending equipment, and the switched beam codebook of the receiving equipment only needs to carry out coarse beam scanning because the signal arrival angle estimation of different sending equipment does not depend on the fine scanning of the beam.

In a possible implementation manner, an array antenna architecture of the receiving device is an analog beamforming architecture, and the receiving device sequentially switches each column of beamforming vectors in one or more columns of beamforming vectors to adjust a beam direction of a receiving beam corresponding to each column of beamforming vectors.

In a possible implementation manner, an array antenna architecture of the receiving device is a hybrid beam forming architecture, and each column of beam forming vectors further corresponds to a group of digital beam forming weights; and the receiving equipment sequentially switches at least one row of beam forming vectors in the one or more rows of beam forming vectors so as to adjust the beam direction of the receiving beam corresponding to the at least one row of beam forming vectors.

In a possible implementation manner, the determining, by the receiving device, a signal arrival angle of the transmitting device according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm includes: and the receiving equipment obtains one or more angles to be evaluated according to the target angle range. And the receiving equipment calculates the evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated in one or more angles to be evaluated according to the beam mapping matrix. And the receiving equipment determines the angle to be evaluated corresponding to the peak evaluation index in the one or more evaluation indexes as the signal arrival angle.

In a possible implementation manner, the calculating, by the receiving device, an evaluation index corresponding to each to-be-evaluated angle in one or more to-be-evaluated angles according to the beam mapping matrix includes: the receiving device is based on the formula

And calculating the evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated. Wherein the content of the first and second substances,

s (theta) represents a feature vector to construct a noise subspace, and is (q) ([ q ]_B-L(θ),...,q_B(θ)]，

A conjugate transpose matrix representing the virtual beam codebook, a (θ) the array response vector for the direction to be evaluated, S^HAnd (theta) represents a conjugate transpose matrix of the feature vector construction noise subspace, and P (theta) represents an evaluation index.

In one possible implementationThe receiving device performs a beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix, including: the receiving equipment obtains a beam mapping matrix according to the received signal matrix and the coefficient related to the angle to be evaluated; wherein the angle-dependent coefficients to be evaluated

Where a (θ) represents the array response vector corresponding to the direction to be evaluated,

a b-th column representing a virtual beam codebook,

b is greater than 1 and less than or equal to the number of the multiple reference signals, and the virtual beam codebook satisfies mutual orthogonality among different column vectors.

In a possible implementation manner, before the sending device and the receiving device communicate by using a frequency division multiple access FDMA technique or an orthogonal frequency division multiple access OFDMA technique, and the receiving device performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals, the method provided in the embodiment of the present application further includes: the receiving apparatus converts the multiple reception signal from the time domain to the frequency domain. Therefore, multiple received signals of different sending devices can be distinguished from a frequency domain, and the arrival angles of the signals of the multiple sending devices can be calculated in parallel.

In a possible implementation manner, the transmitting device and the receiving device use a carrier sense multiple access CSMA technology communication or a time division multiple access TDMA technology communication, and the receiving device sequentially switches a plurality of receiving beams to receive the same reference signal that is transmitted by the transmitting device on a reference signal resource for a plurality of times, so as to obtain a plurality of received signals, including: the receiving equipment receives the same reference signals which are sent by the sending equipment on the reference signal resources for multiple times by sequentially switching the beam directions of a plurality of receiving beams and adopting a time domain sampling signal method to obtain multiple receiving signals. This allows the signal arrival angles of multiple transmitting devices to be calculated serially in the time domain.

In a possible implementation manner, the method provided in the embodiment of the present application further includes: the receiving device sends a control signaling to the sending device, wherein the control signaling is used for determining the reference signal resource configured for the sending device and the repetition times of the reference signal sent in the reference signal resource. This facilitates the transmitting device determining to repeatedly transmit the same reference signal a plurality of times on the reference signal resource indicated by the receiving device.

In one possible implementation, the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using a frequency division multiple access, FDMA, technique or an orthogonal frequency division multiple access, OFDMA, technique, and the reference signal resources are orthogonal in the frequency domain to the reference signal resources that the receiving device configures for other transmitting devices. This facilitates the receiving device to compute the signal angle-of-arrival of a plurality of different transmitting devices in parallel.

In a possible implementation manner, the receiving device sequentially switches the beam directions of the multiple receiving beams to receive multiple times of the same reference signal sent by the sending device on the reference signal resource, so as to obtain multiple times of received signals, further comprising: the receiving device receives at least one reference signal which is simultaneously transmitted to the receiving device by other transmitting devices. This facilitates multiple different transmitting devices to transmit multiple repeated reference signals simultaneously, saving time for the receiving device to calculate the angles of arrival of the signals of the multiple different transmitting devices.

In one possible implementation, the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using a carrier sense multiple access CSMA technique or a time division multiple access TDMA technique, and the time domain of the reference signal resource is different from the time domain of the reference signal resource configured by the receiving device for other transmitting devices. This facilitates the receiving device to calculate the signal arrival angles of a plurality of different transmitting devices in turn.

In one possible implementation, the multiple reference signals are continuous or discontinuous in time.

In a possible implementation manner, the method provided in the embodiment of the present application further includes: and the receiving equipment adjusts the receiving beam direction between the access equipment and the transmitting equipment according to the arrival angle of the signal.

In a second aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal, including: the transmitting device determines a reference signal resource and a number of repetitions of a reference signal transmitted at the reference signal resource. And the sending equipment sends the same reference signal to the receiving equipment for multiple times on the reference signal resource according to the repetition times, and the multiple reference signals are used for calculating the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment.

In one possible implementation, the determining, by a transmitting device, a number of repetitions of a reference signal resource and a reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource includes: the sending device receives a control signaling from the receiving device, wherein the control signaling is used for determining the reference signal resource configured for the sending device and the repetition times of the reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource.

In a possible implementation manner, the sending device and the receiving device communicate by using a frequency division multiple access FDMA technique or an orthogonal frequency division multiple access OFDMA technique, and frequency domain resources where reference signal resources are located are orthogonal to frequency domain resources where reference signal resources configured for other sending devices by the receiving device are located.

In one possible implementation, the transmitting device and said receiving device communicate using carrier sense multiple access, CSMA, technology or time division multiple access, TDMA technology,

the time domain resource where the reference signal resource is located is different from the time domain resource where the reference signal resource configured for other sending equipment by the receiving equipment is located.

In one possible implementation, the at least one reference signal is continuous or discontinuous in time.

In a third aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication apparatus, which may implement the method in the first aspect or any possible implementation manner of the first aspect, and therefore may also implement the beneficial effects in the first aspect or any possible implementation manner of the first aspect. The communication apparatus may be a receiving device, or may be an apparatus that can support the receiving device to implement the method in the first aspect or any possible implementation manner of the first aspect, for example, a chip applied in the receiving device. The device can realize the method through software, hardware or corresponding software executed by hardware.

An example, the communications apparatus, comprising: and the communication unit is used for sequentially switching multiple same reference signals which are sent on the reference signal resource by the multiple receiving beam receiving and sending devices to obtain multiple receiving signals. The beam directions of the plurality of reception beams are different, and the beam directions of the plurality of reception beams correspond to the multiple reference signals one to one. And the processing unit is used for performing digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals. And the processing unit is used for executing beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix. And the processing unit is used for determining the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm.

In a possible implementation manner, the processing unit is specifically configured to determine at least one receiving beam from the multiple receiving beams according to the signal parameters of the multiple receiving beams, to determine at least one receiving signal corresponding to the at least one receiving beam according to the at least one receiving beam, and to perform digital signal processing on the at least one receiving signal, and to determine a receiving signal matrix corresponding to the at least one receiving signal as a receiving signal matrix corresponding to the multiple receiving signals.

In one possible implementation, the beam directions of the multiple receive beams are determined by a switched beam codebook, the switched beam codebook includes one or more columns of beamforming vectors, each column of beamforming vectors in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors corresponds to one set of phase shift values of the phase shifter, and each column of beamforming vectors is used to determine the beam direction of one receive beam.

In a possible implementation manner, the array antenna architecture of the receiving device is an analog beamforming architecture, and the communication unit is specifically configured to sequentially switch each column of beamforming vectors in one or more columns of beamforming vectors to adjust a beam direction of a receiving beam corresponding to each column of beamforming vectors.

In a possible implementation manner, an array antenna architecture of the receiving device is a hybrid beam forming architecture, and each column of beam forming vectors further corresponds to a group of digital beam forming weights; the communication unit is specifically configured to sequentially switch at least one of the one or more columns of beamforming vectors to adjust a beam direction of a receive beam corresponding to the at least one column of beamforming vectors.

In a possible implementation manner, the processing unit is specifically configured to obtain one or more angles to be evaluated according to the target angle range. And the processing unit is specifically configured to calculate an evaluation index corresponding to each to-be-evaluated angle in the one or more to-be-evaluated angles according to the beam mapping matrix. And the processing unit is specifically configured to determine an angle to be evaluated, which corresponds to a peak evaluation index in the one or more evaluation indexes, as an angle of arrival of the signal.

In a possible implementation, the processing unit is specifically configured to operate according to a formula

In a possible implementation manner, the processing unit is specifically configured to obtain a beam mapping matrix according to the received signal matrix and a coefficient related to an angle to be evaluated; wherein the angle-dependent coefficients to be evaluated

A b-th column representing a virtual beam codebook,

In a possible implementation, the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using a frequency division multiple access, FDMA, technique or an orthogonal frequency division multiple access, OFDMA, technique, and the processing unit is further configured to convert the multiple received signals from the time domain to the frequency domain.

In a possible implementation manner, the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using a carrier sense multiple access CSMA technique or a time division multiple access TDMA technique, and the communication unit is specifically configured to obtain multiple received signals by sequentially switching beam directions of multiple received beams and receiving multiple times of the same reference signal sent on the reference signal resource by the transmitting device using a time domain sampling signal method. This allows the signal arrival angles of multiple transmitting devices to be calculated serially in the time domain.

In a possible implementation manner, the communication unit is specifically configured to send a control signaling to the sending device, where the control signaling is used to determine a reference signal resource configured for the sending device and a repetition number of a reference signal sent in the reference signal resource. This facilitates the transmitting device determining to repeatedly transmit the same reference signal a plurality of times on the reference signal resource indicated by the receiving device.

In a possible implementation manner, the communication unit is further configured to receive at least one reference signal that is simultaneously transmitted to the receiving device by other transmitting devices. This facilitates multiple different transmitting devices to transmit multiple repeated reference signals simultaneously, saving time for the receiving device to calculate the angles of arrival of the signals of the multiple different transmitting devices.

In a possible implementation manner, the processing unit is further configured to adjust a receiving beam direction between the access device and the transmitting device according to the signal arrival angle.

In another example, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication apparatus, where the communication apparatus may be a receiving device or a chip in the receiving device. When the communication device is a receiving apparatus, the communication unit may be a transceiver. The processing unit may be a processor. The communication device may further include a storage unit. The storage unit may be a memory. The memory unit is to store computer program code, the computer program code comprising instructions. The processing unit executes the instructions stored by the storage unit to cause the receiving device to implement the method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal described in the first aspect or any one of the possible implementation manners of the first aspect. When the communication device is a chip within a receiving apparatus, the processing unit may be a processor, and the communication unit may be collectively referred to as: a communication interface. For example, the communication interface may be an input/output interface, a pin or a circuit, or the like. The processing unit executes computer program code stored by a memory unit, which may be a memory unit within the chip (e.g., a register, a cache, etc.) or a memory unit external to the chip within the receiving device (e.g., a read-only memory, a random access memory, etc.), to cause the receiving device to implement a method of determining a signal arrival angle as described in the first aspect or any one of the possible implementations of the first aspect.

Optionally, the processor, the communication interface and the memory are coupled to each other.

In a fourth aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a communication apparatus, which may implement the method in the second aspect or any possible implementation manner of the second aspect, and therefore may also achieve the beneficial effects in the second aspect or any possible implementation manner of the second aspect. The communication device may be a sending device, or may be a device that can support the sending device to implement the method in the second aspect or any possible implementation manner of the second aspect, for example, a chip applied in the sending device. The device can realize the method through software, hardware or corresponding software executed by hardware.

An example, the communications apparatus, comprising: and the processing unit is used for determining the reference signal resource and the repetition times of the reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource. And the communication unit is used for sending the same reference signal to the receiving equipment for multiple times on the reference signal resource according to the repetition times, and the multiple reference signals are used for calculating the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment.

In a possible implementation manner, the communication unit is further configured to receive a control signaling from the receiving device, where the control signaling is used to determine a reference signal resource configured for the transmitting device and a repetition number of a reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource.

In a possible implementation manner, the sending device and the receiving device communicate by using a frequency division multiple access FDMA technique or an orthogonal frequency division multiple access OFDMA technique, and frequency domain resources in which the reference signal resources are located are orthogonal to frequency domain resources in which reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for other sending devices are located.

In a possible implementation manner, the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using a carrier sense multiple access CSMA technique or a time division multiple access TDMA technique, and a time domain resource in which the reference signal resource is located is different from a time domain resource in which the reference signal resource configured for other transmitting devices by the receiving device is located.

In another example, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication apparatus, where the communication apparatus may be a sending device, or may be a chip in the sending device. When the communication device is a transmitting device, the communication unit may be a transceiver. The processing unit may be a processor. The communication device may further include a storage unit. The storage unit may be a memory. The memory unit is to store computer program code, the computer program code comprising instructions. The processing unit executes the instructions stored by the storage unit to cause the transmitting device to implement the method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal described in the second aspect or any one of the possible implementations of the second aspect. When the communication device is a chip within a transmitting device, the processing unit may be a processor, and the communication unit may be collectively referred to as: a communication interface. For example, the communication interface may be an input/output interface, a pin or a circuit, or the like. The processing unit executes computer program code stored by a memory unit, which may be a memory unit within the chip (e.g. a register, a cache, etc.) or a memory unit external to the chip within the transmitting device (e.g. a read-only memory, a random access memory, etc.), to cause the transmitting device to implement a method of determining an angle of arrival of a signal as described in the second aspect or any one of the possible implementations of the second aspect.

In a fifth aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a computer-readable storage medium, in which a computer program or instructions are stored, and when the computer program or instructions are run on a computer, the computer is caused to execute a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal as described in any one of the possible implementation manners of the first aspect to the first aspect.

In a sixth aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a computer-readable storage medium, in which a computer program or instructions are stored, and when the computer program or instructions are run on a computer, the computer is caused to execute a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal as described in any one of the possible implementation manners of the second aspect to the second aspect.

In a seventh aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a computer program product including instructions that, when executed on a computer, cause the computer to perform a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal described in the first aspect or in various possible implementations of the first aspect.

In an eighth aspect, the present application provides a computer program product comprising instructions which, when run on a computer, cause the computer to perform a method of determining an angle of arrival of a signal as described in the second aspect or in various possible implementations of the second aspect.

In a ninth aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication system, which includes a receiving device and at least one sending device. The receiving device is configured to execute the method for determining the angle of arrival of the signal described in the first aspect and various possible implementations of the first aspect, and the transmitting device is configured to execute the method for determining the angle of arrival of the signal described in the second aspect and various possible implementations of the second aspect.

In a tenth aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication apparatus, which includes a processor and a storage medium, where the storage medium stores instructions that, when executed by the processor, implement a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal as described in the first aspect or various possible implementation manners of the first aspect.

In an eleventh aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a communication apparatus, which includes a processor and a storage medium, where the storage medium stores instructions that, when executed by the processor, implement a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal as described in the second aspect or various possible implementation manners of the second aspect.

In a twelfth aspect, the present application provides a communication apparatus, which includes one or more modules, configured to implement the methods of the first and second aspects, where the one or more modules may correspond to each step in the methods of the first and second aspects.

In a thirteenth aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a chip, where the chip includes a processor and a communication interface, where the communication interface is coupled to the processor, and the processor is configured to execute a computer program or instructions to implement the method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal described in the first aspect or in various possible implementations of the first aspect, and the communication interface is configured to communicate with another module outside the chip.

In a fourteenth aspect, embodiments of the present application provide a chip, where the chip includes a processor and a communication interface, where the communication interface is coupled to the processor, and the processor is configured to execute a computer program or instructions to implement one method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal described in the second aspect or in various possible implementations of the second aspect, and the communication interface is configured to communicate with another module outside the chip.

Any one of the above-provided apparatuses, computer storage media, computer program products, chips, or communication systems is configured to execute the above-provided corresponding methods, and therefore, the beneficial effects that can be achieved by the apparatuses, the computer storage media, the computer program products, the chips, or the communication systems can refer to the beneficial effects of the corresponding schemes in the above-provided corresponding methods, and are not described herein again.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic diagram of beam training provided in an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 2a is a digital beamforming architecture according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 2b is an analog beamforming architecture according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 2c is a hybrid beamforming architecture according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 3 is a schematic structural diagram of an estimating AOA according to an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 4 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication system according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 5 is a schematic flowchart of a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 6 is a schematic flowchart of another method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 7 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication device according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 8 is a schematic structural diagram of another communication device according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 9 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication device according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 10 is a schematic structural diagram of a chip according to an embodiment of the present application.

Detailed Description

In the embodiment of the present application, the term "and/or" is only one kind of association relationship describing an associated object, and means that three relationships may exist, for example, a and/or B may mean: a exists alone, A and B exist simultaneously, and B exists alone. In addition, the character "/" in the embodiment of the present application generally indicates that the preceding and following related objects are in an "or" relationship.

It should be noted that in the embodiments of the present application, words such as "exemplary" or "for example" are used to indicate examples, illustrations or explanations. Any embodiment or design described herein as "exemplary" or "e.g.," is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other embodiments or designs. Rather, use of the word "exemplary" or "such as" is intended to present concepts related in a concrete fashion.

The network architecture and the service scenario described in the embodiment of the present application are for more clearly illustrating the technical solution of the embodiment of the present application, and do not form a limitation on the technical solution provided in the embodiment of the present application, and as a person of ordinary skill in the art knows that along with the evolution of the network architecture and the appearance of a new service scenario, the technical solution provided in the embodiment of the present application is also applicable to similar technical problems.

Before introducing the embodiments of the present application, first, the related terms referred to in the embodiments of the present application are explained:

radio frequency link (RF chain): the radio frequency antenna and the baseband digital signal processing unit are connected by a series of devices. Typically including Analog to Digital converters (ADCs)/Digital to Analog converters (DACs), mixers, oscillators, filters, etc.

An array antenna: an antenna array formed by arranging a plurality of antennas according to a certain geometrical structure comprises a one-dimensional linear array antenna and a two-dimensional rectangular array antenna. Each antenna is also called an array element. For example, the plurality of antennas may be arranged at a predetermined interval to form an antenna array.

Beamforming: by adjusting the phase (and sometimes amplitude) of the signal fed to each element of the array antenna, i.e. by weighting the signal of each element, the effect of focusing the signal energy in a certain direction, i.e. forming a directional beam, is achieved.

Digital beamforming (digital beamforming) architecture: each array element in the array antenna is connected with the baseband digital signal processing unit through a radio frequency link, so that beam forming is completely completed through a baseband digital signal processing mode. As shown in fig. 2 a. In fig. 2a array element 1, array element 2, …, array element N are each connected to one RF chain, i.e. in fig. 2a there are N RF chains. The N RF chains are connected to a baseband digital signal processing unit. The baseband digital signal processing unit is used for carrying out digital beam forming.

Analog beamforming (analog beamforming) architecture: an array antenna is connected with a baseband signal processing unit by using only one radio frequency link, wherein each array element is connected with a phase shifter for controlling the phase shift of each path of signal, namely beam forming is completed in a radio frequency analog domain. As shown in fig. 2b, each of the N elements in fig. 2b is connected to one phase shifter, i.e. there are N phase shifters in fig. 2 b. The N phase shifters are connected to an RF chain, which is connected to the baseband signal processing unit.

Hybrid beamforming (hybrid beamforming) architecture: an array antenna uses a plurality of radio frequency links to connect with a baseband signal processing unit, wherein the number of the radio frequency links is less than that of the antenna array elements, and the beamforming is completed by a phase shifter in a radio frequency analog domain and signal processing in a digital domain. As shown in fig. 2c, each of the N array elements is connected to an analog beam forming unit, and after controlling the phase shift of each path of signal by using a phase shifter in the radio frequency analog domain, the signal is connected to the baseband signal processing unit through I rfchains.

For example, the Array elements in fig. 2 a-2 c are illustrated by using a Uniform Linear Array (ULA), i.e. the spacing between the Array elements is equal. Of course, in an actual process, the intervals between the array elements may be equal or unequal, and this is not limited in this application.

The Multiple Signal Classification (MUSIC) algorithm is a high-resolution Angle of Arrival (AoA) estimation algorithm based on array antennas. As shown in fig. 3, the conventional MUSIC algorithm is suitable for a digital beamforming architecture, a radio frequency signal received by each array element is converted into digital baseband signals through respective RF chain, and the MUSIC algorithm processes the digital baseband signals to estimate the AoA.

The specific process is as follows: as shown in FIG. 3 (a), the signal AoA of the plane wave is θ_xFor example, the plane wave is given by θ_xTo the ULA antenna of the receiver. The ULA antenna is composed of N array elements which are arranged on a straight line at equal intervals, and the interval between the adjacent array elements is d. An arbitrary signal AoA θ is defined with the normal direction of the array as the reference direction. When the signal AoA is in the normal direction, θ is 0 °. When the signal AoA rotates clockwise, θ increases. When the signal AoA rotates counterclockwise, θ decreases. Thus, -90 ° < θ < 90 °. When theta is more than 0 and less than 90 degrees, the plane wave reaches the array element N firstly, the plane wave reaches the array element 1 finally, and the wave path difference between the array element N and the array element 1 is x_nN, (N-1) dsin θ, N1. The larger the array element serial number is, the more advanced the phase is, the phase difference of the array element n advanced the array element 1 is

Similarly, when theta is more than 90 degrees and less than 0 degree, the phase difference of the array element n before the array element 1 is as follows:

at this time, theta and delta phi_nIs negative, where λ is the wavelength of the signal carrier. To describe the above properties, taking array element 1 as a reference array element, an array response vector of a uniform linear antenna array is defined as:

θ for a signal AoA_xThe baseband discrete-time signal vector model of the received signal can be expressed as: y (m) s (m) a (θ)_x) + n (m). Where m represents the sampling time, s (m) represents the complex sampled signal received by the array element 1, and n (m) represents the noise vector. The MUSIC algorithm uses the received array signal vector y (m) to estimate θ_xThe concrete steps are as follows, step 1 to step 5.

Step 1, estimating a cross-correlation matrix of a received signal vector by using M sampling points.

Wherein R is_yyRepresenting the cross-correlation matrix and M representing the number of sample points.

Step 2, decomposing the cross-correlation matrix R_yyThe characteristic value of (2).

R_yyq_n＝λ_nq_nN is 1. Wherein λ is₁≥λ₂≥…≥λ_N≥0

And 3, expanding the eigenvectors corresponding to the N-1 minimum eigenvalues into a noise space.

S_n＝[q₂，...，q_N]Wherein S is_nRepresenting the noise space.

Wherein the array responds to vector a (theta)_x) And S_nAre orthogonal to each other, i.e.

Step 4, searching theta values in a certain angle range to obtain a spatial spectrum function

Step 5, according to the orthogonality, the theta value corresponding to the peak value of the spatial spectrum function is theta_xAn estimate of (d).

In order to reduce the computational complexity, digital beamforming may be performed to convert the received signal from the array element space to the beam space (dimension reduction) during digital signal processing. As shown in (b) of fig. 3, the dimension of the digital beamforming matrix W is N × K, where K < N as long as it satisfies the condition W^HThe orthogonality relation used by the MUSIC algorithm is still satisfied when W is I, and the MUSIC algorithm can estimate the AoA by using the signal after dimensionality reduction.

As shown in fig. 4, fig. 4 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication system according to an embodiment of the present application. The system comprises: one or more transmitting devices (e.g., transmitting device 10, transmitting device 20, and transmitting device 30) and at least one receiving device 40 (only three transmitting devices are shown in fig. 4, and more or less than three transmitting devices may be included in a practical scenario) in communication with the one or more transmitting devices. In fig. 4, a transmitting device is taken as a terminal, and a receiving device 40 is taken as a base station as an example.

The receiving device 40 and the transmitting device in the embodiment of the present application are provided with array antennas.

The embodiments of the present application are described with reference to a sending device and a receiving device, where the sending device may be an access device and the receiving device is a terminal; alternatively, the sending device may be a terminal, and the receiving device may be an access device. For example, in the embodiment of the present application, a sending device is taken as a terminal, and a receiving device may be an access device (e.g., a base station) as an example. Alternatively, the transmitting device may be a terminal (e.g., a UE) and the receiving device may be an access device (e.g., a base station). Of course, for a relay system, the receiving device 40 and the transmitting device may be relay base stations. Alternatively, the receiving device 40 is a donor base station, and the transmitting device is a relay base station. Or the receiving device 40 is a relay base station and the transmitting device is a terminal.

In the embodiments of the present application, the sending devices may be distributed throughout the network, and the sending devices may be static or mobile.

It should be understood that the data or control information sent by the sending device to the receiving device 40 may directly reach the receiving device 40, but the data or control information sent by the sending device may also reach the receiving device 40 after passing through an obstacle (e.g., a reflector). It may be possible for the receiving device 40 to have at least one receive beam (beam) each of which may receive data or control information from the transmitting device within its coverage area. A beam for transmitting control information or data may be referred to as a transmission beam in the embodiments of the present application. A beam for receiving control information or data is referred to as a reception beam.

In the embodiment of the present application, taking the receiving device 40 as an example of a base station, the base station may form a plurality of transmission beams or receiving beams by using a beamforming technology (e.g., Digital beamforming or Analog beamforming). The transmission beam may be used for the base station to send downlink control information or downlink data to the terminal. The receive beam may be used for the base station to receive uplink control information or uplink data from the terminal.

The angles covered by the respective transmission beams or reception beams may be the same or different, and there may be overlapping portions of the transmission beams or reception beams of different coverage angles. For example, the base station may transmit downlink control information using a transmission beam having a wide coverage angle and transmit downlink data using a transmission beam having a narrow coverage angle.

Taking the transmitting device as an example, the terminal may form multiple receiving beams or multiple transmission beams by using beamforming technology, and determine to use one or multiple receiving beams for receiving according to the transmission beam used by the base station. The terminal may receive downlink information transmitted by the base station within a coverage area of one or more of the receive beams or receive beam sets or beam groups. For convenience of description, the beams referred to in the embodiments of the present application may refer to a single or a plurality of beams.

The beam in the embodiment of the present application may be understood as a spatial resource, and may refer to a transmission or reception precoding vector having an energy transmission directivity. And, the transmission or reception precoding vector can be identified by index information. The energy transmission directivity can mean that in a certain spatial position, a signal subjected to precoding processing by the precoding vector is received with good receiving power, such as meeting the receiving demodulation signal-to-noise ratio; energy transmission directivity may also refer to the reception of the same signal transmitted from different spatial locations with different received powers through the precoding vector.

Optionally, the terminal or the base station may have different precoding vectors, and different terminals or base stations may also have different precoding vectors, that is, corresponding to different beams.

One terminal or base station may use one or more of a plurality of different precoding vectors at the same time, i.e. may form one or more beams at the same time, depending on the configuration or capabilities of the terminal or base station. The information of the beam may be identified by index information. Alternatively, the index information may correspond to an Identifier (ID) of a resource configured for the terminal, for example, the index information may correspond to an ID or a resource of a Channel state information Reference Signal (CSI-RS) configured for the terminal, or may correspond to an ID or a resource of an uplink Sounding Reference Signal (SRS) configured for the terminal. Or, alternatively, the index information may also be index information explicitly or implicitly carried by a signal or channel carried by a beam, for example, the index information may be index information indicating the beam by a synchronization signal or a broadcast channel transmitted by the beam.

It should be understood that the communication system as shown in fig. 4 may be used in a 5G NR millimeter wave communication system with beam alignment between any two nodes having communication needs. The two nodes may be a base station and a terminal, respectively, and in a 5G NR relay system, beam training and alignment may be performed between relay base stations, between a relay base station and a terminal, and between a relay base station and a host base station, and in a 5G NR D2D communication system, beam training and alignment may be performed between two terminals, that is, both the transmitting device and the receiving device are terminals. The embodiment of the application can also be used for beam training and alignment between any two nodes with communication requirements in millimeter wave wireless local area networks and personal area networks based on IEEE 802.11ad/ay and IEEE 802.15.3c standards.

To overcome the severe path loss of millimeter-wave signals, one or more of the transmitting device and the receiving device 40 are configured with array antennas. When a receiving device 40 (e.g., a base station) and one or more transmitting devices (e.g., terminals) need to perform data transmission, beam alignment is first required. The beam alignment comprises the determination of the beam direction of the terminal side and the beam direction of the base station side, and the determination of the beam direction of the terminal side can directly detect the downlink reference signal broadcast by the base station side, so that the beam direction of the terminal side is guided by utilizing the method for estimating the arrival angle of the signal, which is more direct and simple. Therefore, the following embodiments take a process in which the base station determines the beam direction on the base station side by using the uplink reference signal transmitted by each terminal as an example.

A terminal (terminal) is a device that provides voice and/or data connectivity to a user. Such as a handheld device, a vehicle-mounted device, etc., having a wireless connection function. The terminal may also be referred to as: the Mobile Terminal comprises Terminal Equipment (Terminal Equipment), User Equipment (UE), an Access Terminal (Access Terminal), a User Unit (User Unit), a User Station (User Station), a Mobile Station (Mobile Station), a Remote Station (Remote Station), a Remote Terminal (Remote Terminal), Mobile Equipment (Mobile Equipment), a User Terminal (User Terminal), Wireless communication Equipment (Wireless Terminal Equipment), a User Agent (User Agent), User Equipment (User Equipment) or a User device. The terminal device may be a Station (STA) in a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), and may be a cellular phone, a cordless phone, a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) phone, a Wireless Local Loop (WLL) Station, a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) device, a handheld device with Wireless communication function, a computing device or other processing device connected to a Wireless modem, a vehicle-mounted device, a wearable device, and a terminal in a next Generation communication system (e.g., a Fifth-Generation (5G) communication Network) or a terminal in a future-evolution Public Land Mobile Network (PLMN) Network, and the like. Among them, 5G may also be referred to as New Radio (NR). In the present application, the method executed by the terminal may be specifically implemented by a chip in the terminal.

As an example, in the embodiment of the present invention, the terminal may also be a wearable device. Wearable equipment can also be called wearable intelligent equipment, is the general term of applying wearable technique to carry out intelligent design, develop the equipment that can dress to daily wearing, like glasses, gloves, wrist-watch, dress and shoes etc.. A wearable device is a portable device that is worn directly on the body or integrated into the clothing or accessories of the user. The wearable device is not only a hardware device, but also realizes powerful functions through software support, data interaction and cloud interaction. The generalized wearable smart device includes full functionality, large size, and can implement full or partial functionality without relying on a smart phone, such as: smart watches or smart glasses and the like, and only focus on a certain type of application functions, and need to be used in cooperation with other devices such as smart phones, such as various smart bracelets for physical sign monitoring, smart jewelry and the like.

An access device may be a device for communicating with a terminal. An access device may also be referred to as a wireless access device or a network device, i.e. a device communicating with a terminal over a wireless technology. The access device may be an Access Point (AP) in a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), a base Station (BTS) in GSM or CDMA, a base Station (NodeB, NB) in WCDMA, an evolved Node B (eNB, eNodeB) in LTE, a relay Station or an access point, a vehicle-mounted device, a wearable device, a Next Generation Node B (The Next Generation Node B, gNB) in a 5G Wireless relay communication system, a base Station in a future Wireless relay communication system, or an access Node in a Wireless-fidelity (WiFi) system, and The like. In this application, the method performed by the access device may be specifically implemented by a chip in the access device.

In addition, in the embodiment of the present invention, the access device provides a service for a cell, and the terminal communicates with the access device through a transmission resource (for example, a frequency domain resource, or a spectrum resource) used by the cell. The cell may be a cell corresponding to an access device (e.g., a base station), and the cell may belong to a macro base station or a base station corresponding to a small cell (small cell), where the small cell may include: urban cells (Metro cells), Micro cells (Micro cells), pico cells (pico cells), Femto cells (Femto cells), and the like, and the small cells have the characteristics of small coverage area and low transmission power, and are suitable for providing high-rate data transmission services.

The method and the device provided by the embodiment of the invention can be applied to a terminal or access equipment, and the terminal or the access equipment comprises a hardware layer, an operating system layer running on the hardware layer and an application layer running on the operating system layer. The hardware layer includes hardware such as a Central Processing Unit (CPU), a Memory Management Unit (MMU), and a memory (also referred to as a main memory). The operating system may be any one or more computer operating systems that implement business processing through processes (processes), such as a Linux operating system, a Unix operating system, an Android operating system, an iOS operating system, or a windows operating system. The application layer comprises applications such as a browser, an address list, word processing software, instant messaging software and the like. In the embodiment of the present invention, a specific structure of an execution main body of a method for transmitting a signal is not particularly limited in the embodiment of the present invention, as long as the execution main body can perform communication by the method for transmitting a signal according to the embodiment of the present invention by running a program in which a code of the method for transmitting a signal of the embodiment of the present invention is recorded, for example, the execution main body of the method for wireless communication of the embodiment of the present invention may be a terminal or an access device, or a functional module capable of calling a program and executing the program in the terminal or the access device.

Moreover, various aspects or features of embodiments of the invention may be implemented as a method, apparatus, or article of manufacture using standard programming and/or engineering techniques. The term "article of manufacture" as used herein is intended to encompass a computer program accessible from any computer-readable device, carrier, or media. For example, computer-readable media can include but are not limited to magnetic storage devices (e.g., hard disk, floppy disk, magnetic strips, etc.), optical disks (e.g., Compact Disk (CD), Digital Versatile Disk (DVD), etc.), smart cards, and flash memory devices (e.g., erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), card, stick, or key drive, etc.). In addition, various storage media described herein can represent one or more devices and/or other machine-readable media for storing information. The term "machine-readable medium" can include, without being limited to, wireless channels and various other media capable of storing, containing, and/or carrying instruction(s) and/or data.

It should be understood that, in the method for determining the angle of arrival of a signal provided in the embodiment of the present application, all steps performed by the receiving device may also be performed by a chip applied in the receiving device, and all steps performed by the transmitting device may also be performed by a chip applied in the transmitting device. The following embodiments take the interaction between a receiving device and a transmitting device as an example.

As shown in fig. 5, fig. 5 is a detailed flowchart of a method for determining an angle of arrival of a signal, where the method includes:

step 101, the transmitting device determines the reference signal resource and the repetition number of the reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource.

The sending device in step 101 may be, for example, a terminal in fig. 4.

It should be understood that the reference signal resource in the embodiments of the present application is a reference signal resource on a specific radio frame. The reference signal resources on the particular radio frame may be used for the transmitting device to transmit reference signals to the receiving device.

For example, in a 5G system, the specific radio frame may be an uplink symbol or an uplink slot or an uplink subframe defined by the 5G system. In the LTE system, the specific radio frame may be an uplink subframe or a special subframe defined by the LTE system.

The reference signal resource may represent a set of resources used for the transmitting device to transmit a reference signal. In the time domain, the reference signal resource may last for one or more time units, and in a 5G system or an LTE system, the time unit may be an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbol, and the one or more time units may be continuous or discontinuous. In the frequency domain, the reference signal Resource may include one or more frequency units, and in a 5G system or an LTE system, the frequency unit may be a Resource Block (RB), and the one or more frequency units may be continuous or discontinuous.

Illustratively, the reference signal resource includes resource 1, resource 2, and resource 3, where resource 1 and resource 2 are contiguous and resource 2 and resource 3 are non-contiguous. The resource 1, resource 2, and resource 3 may be used to transmit the same reference signal.

Step 102, the sending device sends the same reference signal to the receiving device for a plurality of times on the reference signal resource according to the repetition times.

Specifically, the multiple reference signals are used to calculate the signal arrival angle of the transmitting device.

Step 102 in the embodiments of the present application may also have the following expression: for one reference signal, the transmitting device repeatedly transmits the reference signal to the receiving device on the reference signal resource by the repetition number. For the same sending device, the reference signal resources used by the reference signal sent to the receiving device each time may be the same or different, and this is not limited in this embodiment of the present application.

In the embodiment of the present application, the reference signal repeatedly transmitted to the receiving device by the transmitting device may be continuous or discontinuous in time. For example, for the case of time discontinuity, after the receiving device has transmitted the reference signal once, the next reference signal may be transmitted after a preset time.

For example, taking the number of repetitions of the reference signal as 2 as an example, the transmitting device may transmit the 1 st reference signal to the receiving device on reference signal resource 1, and the transmitting device may transmit the 2 nd reference signal to the receiving device on reference signal resource 2. Or, the transmitting device sequentially transmits the 1 st reference signal and the 2 nd reference signal on the reference signal resource 2 to the receiving device.

In the embodiment of the present application, each of multiple reference signals sent by a sending device reaches a receiving device through L propagation paths, and L arrival angles of the signals correspond to each other. Wherein L is a positive integer.

It should be understood that if the number of repetitions of the reference signal is K, the transmitting device repeats the same reference signal K times on the reference signal resource. K is an integer greater than or equal to 1.

Step 103, the receiving device sequentially switches a plurality of receiving beams to receive the same reference signal sent by the sending device on the reference signal resource for a plurality of times, so as to obtain a plurality of received signals. The beam directions of the plurality of reception beams are different, and the beam directions of the plurality of reception beams correspond to the multiple reference signals one to one.

For example, the receiving device may be an access device as in fig. 4.

It should be understood that the same reference signal propagates through different propagation paths to the receiving device, and that the multiple received signals obtained by the receiving device are different when the receiving device receives the same reference signal by using multiple different received beams. For example, the sequence of sample points of the multiple received signals differ in amplitude and/or phase.

In one implementation, step 103 may be specifically implemented by: the receiving device receives the reference signal corresponding to each receiving beam in the plurality of receiving beams by switching the plurality of receiving beams in turn.

It should be understood that different ones of the plurality of receive beams have different beam directions. Of course, there may be a partial overlap of the reception directions of the different reception beams, in other words the reception directions of the different reception beams may have an intersection.

Illustratively, taking as an example that a transmitting device repeatedly transmits the same reference signal to a receiving device multiple times on the same reference signal resource 1, the receiving device has a receiving beam 1, a receiving beam 2, and a receiving beam 3. The receiving beam 1 is used for receiving a 1 st reference signal sent by the sending device on the reference signal resource 1, the receiving beam 2 is used for receiving a 2 nd reference signal sent by the sending device on the reference signal resource 1, and the receiving beam 3 is used for receiving a 3 rd reference signal sent by the sending device on the reference signal resource 1. For example, after the receiving device receives the 1 st reference signal with the receiving beam 1, the receiving beam may be switched from the receiving beam 1 to the receiving beam 2 to receive the 2 nd reference signal transmitted on the reference signal resource 1 by the transmitting device, and after receiving the 2 nd reference signal, the receiving beam may be switched from the receiving beam 2 to the receiving beam 3 to receive the 3 rd reference signal with the receiving beam 3.

And step 104, the receiving equipment performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals.

Step 105, the receiving device performs a beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix.

And step 106, the receiving equipment determines the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm.

In another possible embodiment, as shown in fig. 6, a method provided in an embodiment of the present application includes: step 204, step 205, step 206, step 207, step 208 and step 209. Step 204 to step 209 may refer to the descriptions in step 101 to step 106, and are not described herein again. In the embodiment shown in fig. 6, before step 204, the method further includes:

step 201, the receiving device obtains a switched beam codebook and a virtual beam codebook.

Illustratively, the switched beam codebook may be an N × K dimensional codebook

Each column in the N x K-dimensional codebook corresponds to a beam forming vector, and one beam forming vector corresponds to a group of phase shift values of the phase shifter. N represents the number of array elements, and the angle range corresponding to the whole sector is divided into K parts by the beams formed by the K beam forming vectors. The size of K depends on the number N of array elements and the channel condition in the current cell, and the smaller the number of array elements is, the better the channel condition is, the smaller K is required. In the existing beam training mechanism using the strength of the received signal, the accuracy of the beam training is proportional to the number of times of beam switching or scanning, i.e. the more the number of times of beam switching, the higher the accuracy of the beam training, and to obtain the higher accuracy of the beam training, the very fine beam switching or scanning is required, resulting in extremely high accuracy A large overhead.

In the embodiment of the present application, the switched beam codebook and the virtual beam codebook may be established by the receiving device itself, or may be prestored in the receiving device.

In the embodiment of the application, because the beam direction is determined without depending on the strength of the received signal, the beam switching times can be greatly reduced, and the accurate signal AoA can be estimated in a digital signal processing mode only depending on the signals collected by the coarse scanning of the beam, and the signal AoA is used for guiding the beam training.

Illustratively, the virtual beam codebook may be an N × B dimensional codebook

And L is more than B and less than K, wherein L is the number of paths which are passed by the sending equipment during uplink transmission. The size of B depends on the number of scatterers in the current environment, and the more multipath components L caused by the scatterers in the environment, the larger B is required. In other words, for a configured value of B, it means that the estimated number of uplink transmission paths is at most B-1 in the current configuration. Each column in the codebook satisfies the relationship

Meaning that the virtual beam direction for each column in the virtual beam codebook is satisfied

Wherein the content of the first and second substances,

c denotes the speed of light, f denotes the carrier frequency, and d denotes the array element spacing.

Accordingly, in step 103 or step 206 of the present application, the beam directions of the multiple receive beams are determined by a switched beam codebook, where the switched beam codebook includes one or more columns of beamforming vectors, each column of beamforming vectors in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors corresponds to one group of phase shift values of the phase shifter, and each column of beamforming vectors is used to determine a beam direction of one receive beam. Specifically, the switched beam codebook may refer to the description in the following embodiments, and is not described herein again.

Since the applicable scenarios of the method provided in the embodiment of the present application are different, and the specific implementation of step 206 is also different, the specific implementation of step 206 will be described below with reference to different scenarios:

scene 1), an array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is an analog beamforming architecture, and the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using a Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) technology or an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) technology.

In one possible implementation, step 206 may be specifically implemented by: the receiving device uses the receiving beams with different directions to detect the multiple reference signals simultaneously transmitted by the transmitting device and other transmitting devices. Specifically, the receiving device sequentially uses the 1 st to kth beamforming vectors in the switched beam codebook W to simultaneously detect the multiple reference signals transmitted by the transmitting device and other transmitting devices. Each receiving beam lasts for one OFDM symbol, and the OFDM symbols correspond to the OFDM symbols occupied by the reference signals transmitted by the transmitting equipment one by one. And finally, obtaining the receiving signal corresponding to each reference signal in the multiple reference signals. For example, in scenario 1, the received signal corresponding to each reference signal may be a time-domain discrete-time signal. The mechanism enables the use of the MUSIC algorithm for AoA estimation also under an analog beamforming architecture. Specifically, conventional MUSIC requires multiple RF chains, reduces computational complexity using digital beamforming, which is done at baseband. Under the analog beamforming, signals corresponding to a plurality of beamforming vectors can be collected only in a mode of beam time division switching, and the signals are used as input parameters of a traditional MUSIC algorithm to estimate AoA.

Correspondingly, in order to accurately calculate the signal arrival angle of the transmitting device in scene 1, the receiving device first converts the received signal corresponding to each reference signal sent by different transmitting devices into a frequency domain, distinguishes each reference signal sent by different transmitting devices in the frequency domain, and calculates the signal arrival angle of each transmitting device respectively.

Therefore, as a possible implementation, the receiving device in the embodiment of the present application performs digital signal processing on multiple received signals in the following manner: the receiving apparatus converts the multiple reception signal from the time domain to the frequency domain.

Specifically, the receiving device performs Inverse Fast Fourier Transform (IFFT) time-frequency conversion on a multiple received signal from the transmitting device and multiple received signals from other transmitting devices, and separates received signals corresponding to different transmitting devices by subcarriers, where the received signal of each transmitting device occupies J subcarriers, and each transmitting device in different transmitting devices corresponds to a frequency domain received signal matrix Y of K × J dimensions_K×J。

In order to reduce the computational complexity, in the embodiment of the present application, digital signal processing may be performed on at least one received signal that meets requirements among multiple received signals, so as to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals.

As a possible implementation of the present application, step 207 in the embodiment of the present application may be specifically implemented by:

the receiving device determines at least one receive beam from the plurality of receive beams based on the signal parameters of the plurality of receive beams.

The receiving device determines at least one receiving signal corresponding to at least one receiving beam according to the at least one receiving beam.

The receiving equipment performs digital signal processing on at least one received signal to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals.

For example, for a transmitting device, the receiving device may determine at least one receiving beam from a plurality of receiving beams according to the signal parameters of the plurality of receiving beams by: the receiving device selects at least one receiving beam from the plurality of receiving beams whose signal parameters meet the requirements according to the signal parameters of the plurality of receiving beams. For example, taking the signal parameter as the signal energy as an example, the receiving apparatus selects, as at least one reception beam, a reception beam having a signal energy greater than or equal to an energy threshold from among the plurality of reception beams, according to the signal energies of the plurality of reception beams.

For example, the receiving apparatus selects B (B is less than or equal to K, and B is greater than or equal to 1) reception beams (which may be simply referred to as "effective reception beams") from among the K reception beams, where the energy of the reception signal is greater than or equal to the energy threshold. The beam forming vectors respectively corresponding to the receiving beams form an effective beam forming matrix

The corresponding frequency domain received signals form an effective received signal matrix Y with dimension B multiplied by J_B×J(i.e., a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals). Wherein, the elements in the row B and the column J represent the OFDM symbols received by the B effective receiving beam on the J sub-carrier.

It should be understood that, in the embodiment of the present application, at least one received signal corresponding to at least one received beam refers to: a received signal on each of the at least one receive beam.

Scene 2), an array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is an analog beam forming architecture, and the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using a Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA) technology or a Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) technology.

In one possible implementation, step 206 may be specifically implemented by: the receiving device uses the receiving beams with different beam directions to detect multiple reference signals transmitted by one transmitting device. Specifically, the receiving device sequentially uses the 1 st to Kth beamforming vectors in the switched beam codebook W to detect the reference signal transmitted by the transmitting device and repeated K times, and M (M is an integer greater than or equal to 1) signal sampling points are detected in each received beam, and finally a receiving signal sampling point with K × M dimensions is formed Matrix Y_K×MAs a multiple received signal.

Accordingly, in scenario 2, the receiving device may directly use the time-domain sampled signal to perform the signal arrival angle estimation.

The receiving device takes the received signal matrix corresponding to at least one received signal as the received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals.

For example, the receiving device selects B receiving beams with the largest energy of the received signals from the K receiving beams as effective beams, and the corresponding beamforming vectors form an effective beamforming matrix

The corresponding received signals form an effective received signal matrix Y with dimension B multiplied by M_B×MAnd the element of the No. B row and the No. M column represents the No. M sampling point received by the No. B effective beam.

In the scene 1 and the scene 2, the receiving device sequentially switches each column of beamforming vectors in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors to adjust the beam direction of the receiving beam corresponding to each column of beamforming vectors.

Scenario 3), the array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is a hybrid beamforming architecture, and in this case, the transmitting device and the receiving device may communicate by using FDMA technology or OFDMA technology. Communication using CSMA techniques or TDMA techniques is also possible.

In one possible implementation, FDMA is used for the transmitting device and the receiving deviceIn case of technology or OFDMA technology communication, step 206 in scenario 3 may specifically be implemented in the following manner, and reference may be made to the description in scenario 1. The difference is that for the hybrid beam forming architecture, since the hybrid beam forming architecture has the capability of simultaneously realizing a plurality of receiving beams, assuming that the number of the receiving beams capable of being simultaneously formed is I, when I > K, the step only needs to consume one OFDM symbol, and when I < K, the step needs to consume

And the OFDM symbols correspond to the OFDM symbols occupied by the reference signals transmitted by the transmitting equipment one to one. The hybrid beamforming architecture can further reduce the beam training overhead.

In addition, when the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using FDMA technology or OFDMA technology, step 207 in scenario 3 may specifically refer to the description in scenario 1.

In another possible implementation manner, when the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using the CSMA technology or the TDMA technology, the step 206 in scenario 3 may specifically refer to the description in scenario 2 through the following specific implementation manner.

In addition, when the transmitting device and the receiving device adopt CSMA technology communication or TDMA technology communication, step 207 in scenario 3 may specifically refer to the description in scenario 2, and is not described herein again.

It should be understood that each column of beamforming vectors in scene 3 may correspond to a set of digital beamforming weights in addition to a set of phase shift values of the phase shifters; and the receiving equipment sequentially switches at least one row of beam forming vectors in the one or more rows of beam forming vectors so as to adjust the beam direction of the receiving beam corresponding to the at least one row of beam forming vectors.

For the above scenarios 1 to 3, step 209 in this embodiment may be specifically implemented by the following manner:

and S1, the receiving equipment obtains one or more angles to be evaluated according to the target angle range.

For example, the target angular range may be an angular range determined when the transmitting device initially accesses the receiving device, and in a 5G or LTE system, the angular range may be one sector.

As a specific implementation, S1 in the embodiment of the present application may be implemented by: with a target angle range of (theta)_l,θ_u) For example, the receiving device may divide the target angle range into one or more angles to be evaluated according to a fixed angle Δ θ. For example, θ ═ θ _l:△θ:θ_u。

And S2, the receiving equipment calculates the evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated in the one or more angles to be evaluated according to the beam mapping matrix.

For any angle theta to be evaluated, the calculation method of the evaluation index P (theta) corresponding to the angle theta to be evaluated is as follows: the receiving device is according to the formula

Calculating an evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated, wherein,

s (theta) represents a feature vector to construct a noise subspace, and is (q) ([ q ]_B-L(θ),...，q_B(θ)]，

In particular, a beam mapping operation is defined as

Wherein B is 1, …, B, J is 1, …, J;

receiving a signal matrix Y in an effective frequency domain in scene 1 or scene 3_B×JFor example, for the effective frequency domain received signal matrix Y_B×JPerforming beam mapping on all signal elements in the signal to obtain

To obtain

Covariance matrix of signals corresponding to different beams

Decomposing the characteristic value of R (theta) and arranging the characteristic values of R (theta) q in the order of big to small_b(θ)＝λ_b(θ)q_b(θ), wherein B is 1, …, B, λ₁≥λ₂≥…≥λ_BIs more than or equal to 0. The receiving device may construct a noise subspace S (θ) ═ q with eigenvectors corresponding to the B-L smallest eigenvalues _B-L(θ),…,q_B(θ)]。

S3, the receiving device determines an angle to be evaluated corresponding to a peak evaluation index in the one or more evaluation indexes as a signal arrival angle of the sending device.

It should be understood that the peak evaluation index may refer to the largest evaluation index of the one or more evaluation indexes.

In an optional implementation manner, the method provided in the embodiment of the present application further includes: the receiving equipment maps the receiving signal matrix into a beam mapping matrix according to a receiving signal matrix corresponding to the multiple receiving signals and a coefficient related to an angle to be evaluated; wherein the coefficients relating to the angle to be evaluated

a b-th column representing a virtual beam codebook,

represents the b-th column of the switched beam codebook, b being greater than 1 and less than or equal to the number of reference signals of the multiple times.

In an alternative implementation, the virtual beam codebook satisfies that different column vectors are orthogonal to each other.

In one possible implementation, if the sending device has the pre-configuration information, the pre-configuration information at least includes: if the reference signal resource is pre-stored and the number of times of repetition of the reference signal corresponding to the pre-stored reference signal resource is determined, step 204 in this embodiment of the present application may be implemented as follows: the transmitting device determines the reference signal resource and the repetition number of the reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource according to the pre-configuration information.

In another possible embodiment, as shown in fig. 6, the method provided in this embodiment of the present application further includes, before step 204:

step 202, the receiving device sends a control signaling to the sending device, where the control signaling is used to determine a reference signal resource configured for the sending device and a repetition number of a reference signal sent in the reference signal resource.

Taking the receiving device as a base station and the transmitting device as a terminal as an example, step 202 may be downlink control signaling (DCI). The DCI is used to determine reference signal resources configured for a transmitting device and the number of repetitions of a reference signal.

Specifically, the receiving device sends a downlink control channel to the sending device, where the downlink control channel carries DCI. For example, the Downlink Control Channel may be a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH).

In the embodiment of the present application, the receiving device may dynamically configure the reference signal resource and the number of repetitions of the reference signal for the sending device. Or the receiving device may semi-statically configure the reference signal resource and the number of repetitions of the reference signal for the transmitting device. Wherein, the dynamic configuration of reference signal resources and the repetition times of reference signals for the transmitting device by the receiving device means: in each beam training period, the receiving device configures reference signal resources and the repetition times of the reference signals for the transmitting device. The reference signal resource and the repetition frequency of the reference signal are configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device in a semi-static manner, which means that: the reference signal resources and the repetition times of the reference signals configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device are not only applicable to the current beam training period, but also applicable to the next beam training period.

Step 203, the sending device receives the control signaling from the receiving device.

In another possible implementation manner, step 204 in the embodiment of the present application may be specifically implemented by the following method: and the sending equipment determines the reference signal resource and the repetition times of the reference signal according to the control signaling.

It should be noted that, if the sending device determines the reference signal resource and the number of repetitions of the reference signal according to the pre-configuration information, steps 202 and 203 may be omitted. I.e. 202 and 203 are optional steps. Of course, if the sending device autonomously determines the reference signal resource and the repetition number of the reference signal according to the preconfigured information, the sending device further needs to send the information of the reference signal resource autonomously determined by the sending device and the repetition number to the receiving device, which is convenient for the receiving device to determine at which reference signal resource to receive the multiple reference signals repeatedly sent by the sending device.

It should be understood that, in the case where the transmitting device can autonomously determine the reference signal resource and the repetition number, if the receiving device configures the transmitting device with the reference signal resource and the repetition number through step 202, the transmitting device performs steps 204 and 205 with the reference signal resource and the repetition number configured by the receiving device.

Due to the difference of the communication technologies adopted between the sending device and the receiving device, there is a difference in the reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for the sending device, and the following will be introduced separately:

example 1), a transmitting device and a receiving device communicate using Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) technology or Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) technology.

In example 1), the reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device are orthogonal in the frequency domain to the reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for other transmitting devices. That is, the receiving device respectively configures time-frequency resources for a plurality of transmitting devices including the transmitting device, different transmitting devices occupy different subcarriers or carriers in the frequency domain, and different transmitting devices can occupy the same OFDM symbol or FDM symbol in the time domain.

In example 1) one OFDM symbol, J subcarriers, at a time are occupied in the multiple reference signals.

That is, if the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using OFDMA or FDMA, the receiving device may configure the reference signal resources orthogonal in the frequency domain for a plurality of different transmitting devices, which facilitates the plurality of different transmitting devices to transmit the reference signal to the receiving device on their respective reference signal resources for a plurality of times at the same time. Therefore, the receiving device can perform beam training on a plurality of different transmitting devices in parallel or simultaneously without conflict. Because different sending devices can repeatedly send the reference signals on the allocated time-frequency resources, a plurality of sending devices can carry out beam training in parallel, and the rapid and accurate beam training performance is finally realized.

In addition, the repetition times configured by the receiving device for different sending devices may be the same or different.

For example, the reference signal resource configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device 10 is located in frequency domain resource 1, and the reference signal resource configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device 20 is located in frequency domain resource 2. The reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device 30 are located in frequency domain resource 3. The frequency domain resource 1, the frequency domain resource 2 and the frequency domain resource 3 are orthogonal in the frequency domain.

It should be noted that, when different sending devices send reference signals to a receiving device at the same time, the used reference signal resources are different. For example, in the first transmission, the transmitting device 1 transmits the first reference signal using the subcarrier 1, the subcarrier 2, and the subcarrier 3, and the transmitting device 2 transmits the first reference signal using the subcarrier 4 and the subcarrier 5. But for reference signals transmitted at different times, the occupied reference signal resources can be the same. For example, in the first transmission, the transmitting device 1 transmits the first reference signal using the subcarrier 1, the subcarrier 2, and the subcarrier 3, and the transmitting device 2 transmits the first reference signal using the subcarrier 4 and the subcarrier 5. At the time of the second transmission, the transmission apparatus 1 transmits the second-time reference signal using the subcarrier 4 and the subcarrier 5. The transmitting device 2 transmits the second-time reference signal using the subcarriers 1, 2.

Example 2), the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA) technology or Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) technology.

The time domain of the reference signal resource configured for the transmitting device by the receiving device in example 2) is different from the time domain of the reference signal resource configured for other transmitting devices by the receiving device. That is, the reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for different transmitting devices are allocated to different time intervals, so that a plurality of different transmitting devices can transmit the reference signals to the receiving device by using the reference signal resources configured for the different transmitting devices in different time intervals. Thus, a plurality of different transmitting devices can perform beam training in series without conflict. It should be understood that in CSMA or TDMA techniques, only one transmitting device occupies the channel, i.e. all frequency domain carriers, at each time instant.

For example, the reference signal resource configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device 1 is located in time domain 1, and the reference signal resource configured by the receiving device for the transmitting device 2 is located in time domain 2.

In example 2), the number of repetitions of the configuration of the receiving device for different transmitting devices may be the same or different.

It should be noted that, in example 1) and example 2), the array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is an analog beamforming architecture, and the number of repetitions of the receiving device configured for the transmitting device is K, which represents the number of beamforming vectors. K is an integer greater than or equal to 1.

Example 3), the array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is a hybrid beamforming architecture. When the array antenna architecture is an analog beamforming architecture, two situations are considered in a system multiple access manner: OFDMA or (FDMA), CSMA (or TDMA), the two multiple access methods differ in whether multiple transmitting devices can perform AoA estimation simultaneously. Similarly, when the array antenna architecture is a hybrid beamforming architecture, the same two situations exist in the system multiple access manner. Example 3) is described only in connection with an OFDMA system.

The hybrid beamforming architecture can simultaneously form a plurality of beams with different directions, and the number of the beams with the different directions is represented by I, so that the overhead of beam switching is further reduced. Different terminals utilize different subcarriers to simultaneously send uplink reference signals, so that beam training can be performed in parallel without conflict. The time frequency resource of each UE sending the uplink reference signal and the effective times of the reference signal are configured by the BS through the downlink control signaling.

It should be noted that, when the array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is a hybrid beamforming architecture, the reference signal resources configured for the transmitting device may be the same as that in example 1), that is, the reference signal resources of a plurality of different transmitting devices are orthogonal in the frequency domain. Of course, when the array antenna architecture of the transmitting device and the receiving device is a hybrid beamforming architecture, the reference signal resources configured for the transmitting device may be the same as that of example 2), that is, the reference signal resources of a plurality of different transmitting devices have different time domains.

A specific example may be the description in example 1), but is different from example 1) in that: in example 3) the same reference signal is repeated on the time axis every time the reference signal occupies one OFDM symbol, J subcarriers

One, i.e. the number of repetitions is

Where I represents the number of beams that hybrid beamforming can simultaneously form.

In a possible embodiment, as shown in fig. 6, the method provided in the embodiment of the present application further includes:

step 210, the receiving device adjusts the receiving beam direction between the access device and the transmitting device according to the arrival angle of the signal.

That is, after determining the signal angle of arrival, the receiving device uses the signal angle of arrival to direct beam pointing, i.e., beam alignment, of a subsequent access device for data transmission with the transmitting device. Specifically, after the arrival angle of the signal is obtained, the beam forming direction is configured to the estimated arrival angle direction of the signal according to the reciprocity of the signal transmission path, so that beam alignment can be achieved, and then data transmission is performed. If a plurality of signal arrival angle directions are detected, one or more optimal signal arrival angle directions can be further determined as beam directions by combining signal energy.

The above-mentioned scheme of the embodiment of the present application is introduced mainly from the perspective of interaction between network elements. It is to be understood that each network element, for example, the receiving device, the sending device, etc., includes a corresponding hardware structure and/or software module for performing each function in order to implement the above functions. Those of skill in the art would readily appreciate that the various illustrative elements and algorithm steps described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented as hardware or combinations of hardware and computer software. Whether a function is performed as hardware or computer software drives hardware depends upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the solution. 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.

In the embodiment of the present application, the receiving device and the sending device may perform the division of the functional units according to the method examples described above, for example, each functional unit may be divided corresponding to each function, or two or more functions may be integrated into one processing unit. The integrated unit can be realized in a form of hardware, and can also be realized in a form of a software functional unit. It should be noted that the division of the unit in the embodiment of the present application is schematic, and is only a logic function division, and there may be another division manner in actual implementation.

The method of the embodiment of the present application is described above with reference to fig. 1 to 6, and a communication apparatus provided in the embodiment of the present application for performing the method is described below. Those skilled in the art will understand that the method and apparatus can be combined and referred to each other, and the communication apparatus provided in the embodiments of the present application can perform the steps performed by the first terminal, the receiving device, and the network device in the above configuration method of the radio bearer.

The following description will be given by taking the division of each function module corresponding to each function as an example:

in case of an integrated unit, fig. 7 shows a communication apparatus according to the above embodiment, which may include: a processing unit 101, and a communication unit 102.

An example of the communication device shown in fig. 7 is a receiving device, or a chip applied to a receiving device. In this case, the communication unit 102 is configured to support the communication apparatus to perform the step 103 performed by the receiving device in the above embodiment. A processing unit 101, configured to support the communication apparatus to perform step 104, step 105, and step 106, which are performed by the receiving device in the foregoing embodiments.

As another example, the communication apparatus is a receiving device or a chip applied in the receiving device. In this case, the communication unit 102 is configured to support the communication apparatus to perform the step 206 performed by the receiving device in the above embodiment. The processing unit 101 is configured to support the communication apparatus to perform step 207, step 208, and step 209 performed by the receiving device in the foregoing embodiments.

In a possible embodiment, the processing unit 101 is further configured to support the communication device to perform step 201 and step 210, which are performed by the receiving apparatus in the foregoing embodiment.

As another example, the communication apparatus shown in fig. 7 is a transmitting device or a chip applied to a transmitting device. In this case, the communication unit 102 is configured to support the communication apparatus to perform the step 102 performed by the sending device in the above embodiment. A processing unit 101 for enabling the communication device to perform the step 101 performed by the sending apparatus in the above embodiment.

As another example, the communication apparatus shown in fig. 7 is a transmitting device or a chip applied to a transmitting device. In this case, the communication unit 102 is configured to support the communication apparatus to perform the step 205 performed by the sending device in the above embodiment. The processing unit 101 is configured to support the communication apparatus to perform step 204 performed by the sending device in the foregoing embodiment.

In a possible embodiment, the communication unit 102 is further configured to support the communication device to perform step 203 performed by the sending device in the foregoing embodiment.

In an alternative embodiment, the communication device shown in fig. 7 may further include: and a memory unit. The storage unit may be configured to store the switched beam codebook and the virtual beam codebook when the communication apparatus is a receiving device or a chip applied to the receiving device. The storage unit may be configured to store the location information of the reference signal resource of the transmitting device and the number of repetitions of the reference signal when the communication apparatus is the transmitting device or a chip applied to the transmitting device.

Fig. 8 shows a schematic diagram of a possible logical structure of the communication apparatus according to the above-described embodiment, in the case of an integrated unit. The communication device includes: a processing module 112 and a communication module 113. The processing module 112 is used for controlling and managing the operation of the communication device, for example, the processing module 112 is used for executing the steps of information/data processing in the communication device. The communication module 113 is used to support the communication device to perform the steps of information/data transmission or reception.

In a possible embodiment, the communication device may further comprise a storage module 111 for storing program codes and data available to the communication device.

An example of the communication apparatus shown in fig. 8 is a receiving device, or a chip applied to a receiving device. In this case, the communication module 113 is configured to enable the communication device to perform the step 103 performed by the receiving apparatus in the above embodiment. A processing module 112, configured to enable the communication device to perform step 104, step 105, and step 106 in the foregoing embodiments.

As another example, the communication apparatus shown in fig. 8 is a receiving device or a chip applied to a receiving device. In this case, the communication module 113 is configured to enable the communication device to perform the step 206 performed by the receiving apparatus in the above embodiment. The processing module 112 is configured to support the communication device to perform step 207, step 208, and step 209 in the above embodiments.

In a possible embodiment, the processing module 112 is further configured to support the communication apparatus to perform step 201 and step 210, which are performed by the receiving device in the foregoing embodiment.

As another example, the communication apparatus shown in fig. 8 is a transmitting device or a chip applied to a transmitting device. In this case, the communication module 113 is configured to support the communication device to perform the step 102 performed by the sending device in the above embodiment. A processing module 112, configured to enable the communication apparatus to perform step 101 performed by the sending device in the foregoing embodiment.

As another example, the communication apparatus shown in fig. 8 is a transmitting device or a chip applied to a transmitting device. In this case, the communication module 113 is configured to enable the communication device to perform the step 205 performed by the sending apparatus in the above embodiment. The processing module 112 is configured to enable the communication apparatus to execute the step 204 executed by the sending device in the foregoing embodiment.

In a possible embodiment, the communication module 113 is further configured to enable the communication device to perform step 203, which is performed by the sending apparatus in the foregoing embodiment.

The processing module 112 may be a processor or controller, such as a central processing unit, a general purpose processor, a digital signal processor, an application specific integrated circuit, a field programmable gate array or other programmable logic device, a transistor logic device, a hardware component, or any combination thereof. Which may implement or perform the various illustrative logical blocks, modules, and circuits described in connection with the disclosure. A processor may also be a combination of computing functions, e.g., a combination of one or more microprocessors, a digital signal processor and a microprocessor, or the like. The communication module 113 may be a transceiver, a transceiving circuit or a communication interface, etc. The storage module 111 may be a memory.

When the processing module 112 is the processor 41 or the processor 45, the communication module 113 is the transceiver 43, and the storage module 111 is the memory 42, the communication device according to the present application may be the communication device shown in fig. 9.

As shown in fig. 9, fig. 9 is a schematic diagram illustrating a hardware structure of a communication device according to an embodiment of the present application. The hardware structures of the transmitting device and the receiving device in the embodiments of the present application may refer to the structure shown in fig. 9. The communication device includes a processor 41, a communication line 44 and at least one transceiver 43.

Processor 41 may be a general-purpose Central Processing Unit (CPU), a microprocessor, an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), or one or more ics for controlling the execution of programs in accordance with the teachings of the present disclosure.

The communication link 44 may include a path for transmitting information between the aforementioned components.

The transceiver 43 may be any device for communicating with other devices or communication networks, such as an ethernet, a Radio Access Network (RAN), a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), etc.

Optionally, the communication device may also include a memory 42.

The memory 42 may be, but is not limited to, a read-only memory (ROM) or other type of static storage device that can store static information and instructions, a Random Access Memory (RAM) or other type of dynamic storage device that can store information and instructions, an electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), a compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM) or other optical disk storage, optical disk storage (including compact disc, laser disc, optical disc, digital versatile disc, blu-ray disc, etc.), magnetic disk storage media or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium that can be used to carry or store desired program code in the form of instructions or data structures and that can be accessed by a computer. The memory may be separate and coupled to the processor via a communication line 44. The memory may also be integral to the processor.

The memory 42 is used for storing computer-executable instructions for executing the present application, and is controlled by the processor 41 to execute. Processor 41 is configured to execute computer-executable instructions stored in memory 42 to implement a method for configuring a radio bearer provided by the embodiments described below in the present application.

Optionally, the computer-executable instructions in the embodiments of the present application may also be referred to as application program codes, which are not specifically limited in the embodiments of the present application.

In particular implementations, processor 41 may include one or more CPUs such as CPU0 and CPU1 in fig. 9, for example, as one embodiment.

In particular implementations, the communication device may include multiple processors, such as processor 41 and processor 45 in fig. 9, for example, as an embodiment. Each of these processors may be a single-core (single-CPU) processor or a multi-core (multi-CPU) processor. A processor herein may refer to one or more devices, circuits, and/or processing cores for processing data (e.g., computer program instructions).

An example, the communication device shown in fig. 9 is a receiving device, and the transceiver 43 is used to support the communication device to execute the step 103 executed by the receiving device in the above embodiment. Processor 41 or processor 45, configured to enable the communication device to perform step 104, step 105 and step 106 in the above embodiments.

As another example, the communication device shown in fig. 9 is a receiving device, and the transceiver 43 is used to support the communication device to execute the step 206 executed by the receiving device in the above embodiment. Processor 41 or processor 45, configured to enable the communication device to perform step 207, step 208 and step 209 in the above embodiments.

In a possible embodiment, processor 41 or processor 45 is further configured to enable the communication device to perform step 201 and step 210 performed by the receiving device in the above-described embodiment.

As another example, the communication device shown in fig. 9 is a sending device, and the transceiver 43 is configured to support the communication device to perform step 102 performed by the sending device in the foregoing embodiment. Processor 41 or processor 45 for enabling the communication device to perform step 101 performed by the transmitting device in the above embodiments.

As another example, the communication device shown in fig. 9 is a sending device, and the transceiver 43 is configured to support the communication device to perform step 205 performed by the sending device in the foregoing embodiment. Processor 41 or processor 45 for enabling the communication device to perform step 204 performed by the transmitting device in the above embodiments.

Fig. 10 is a schematic structural diagram of a chip 150 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. Chip 150 includes one or more (including two) processors 1510 and a communication interface 1530.

Optionally, the chip 150 further includes a memory 1540, which may include both read-only memory and random access memory, and provides operating instructions and data to the processor 1510. A portion of memory 1540 may also include non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM).

In some embodiments, memory 1540 stores elements, execution modules, or data structures, or a subset thereof, or an expanded set thereof.

In the embodiment of the present application, by calling an operation instruction stored in the memory 1540 (the operation instruction may be stored in an operating system), a corresponding operation is performed.

One possible implementation is: the chips used by the receiving device and the sending device are similar in structure, and different devices can use different chips to realize respective functions.

The processor 1510 controls processing operations of either the receiving device or the transmitting device, and the processor 1510 may also be referred to as a Central Processing Unit (CPU).

Memory 1540 can include both read-only memory and random-access memory, and provides instructions and data to processor 1510. A portion of memory 1540 may also include non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM). For example, in an application where memory 1540, communications interface 1530 and memory 1540 are coupled together by bus system 1520, where bus system 1520 may include a power bus, control bus, status signal bus, etc. in addition to a data bus. For clarity of illustration, however, the various buses are labeled as bus system 1520 in fig. 10.

The method disclosed in the embodiments of the present application may be applied to the processor 1510 or implemented by the processor 1510. The processor 1510 may be an integrated circuit chip having signal processing capabilities. In implementation, the steps of the above method may be performed by instructions in the form of hardware, integrated logic circuits, or software in the processor 1510. The processor 1510 may be a general purpose processor, a Digital Signal Processor (DSP), an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), an off-the-shelf programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device, discrete gate or transistor logic device, or discrete hardware components. The various methods, steps, and logic blocks disclosed in the embodiments of the present application may be implemented or performed. A general purpose processor may be a microprocessor or the processor may be any conventional processor or the like. The steps of the method disclosed in connection with the embodiments of the present application may be directly implemented by a hardware decoding processor, or implemented by a combination of hardware and software modules in the decoding processor. The software module may be located in ram, flash memory, rom, prom, or eprom, registers, etc. storage media as is well known in the art. The storage medium is located in the memory 1540, and the processor 1510 reads the information in the memory 1540, and performs the steps of the above method in combination with the hardware thereof.

In one possible implementation, communication interface 1530 is configured to perform the steps of receiving and transmitting by a receiving device and a transmitting device in the embodiments shown in fig. 5 or fig. 6. The processor 1510 is configured to perform steps of the processing of the receiving device and the transmitting device in the embodiments shown in fig. 5 or fig. 6.

The above communication unit may be an interface circuit or a communication interface of the apparatus for receiving signals from other apparatuses. For example, when the device is implemented in the form of a chip, the communication unit is an interface circuit or a communication interface for the chip to receive signals from or transmit signals to other chips or devices.

In the above embodiments, the instructions stored by the memory for execution by the processor may be implemented in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product may be written in the memory in advance or may be downloaded in the form of software and installed in the memory.

The computer program product includes one or more computer instructions. The procedures or functions according to the embodiments of the present application are all or partially generated when the computer program instructions are loaded and executed on a computer. 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 in a computer readable storage medium or transmitted from one computer readable storage medium to another, e.g., the computer instructions may be transmitted from one website, computer, server, or data center to another website, computer, server, or data center via wired (e.g., coaxial cable, fiber optic, Digital Subscriber Line (DSL)) or wireless (e.g., infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.) means. A computer-readable storage medium may be any available medium that a computer can store or a data storage device including one or more available media integrated servers, data centers, and the like. The usable medium may be a magnetic medium (e.g., floppy disk, hard disk, magnetic tape), an optical medium (e.g., DVD), or a semiconductor medium (e.g., Solid State Disk (SSD)), among others.

In one aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, in which instructions are stored, and when executed, cause a receiving device or a chip applied in the receiving device to perform steps 103, 104, 105, and 106 in the embodiments.

On the other hand, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, in which instructions are stored, and when executed, the instructions cause a receiving device or a chip applied in the receiving device to perform steps 201, 206, 207, 208, 209, and 210 in the embodiments.

In still another aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, in which instructions are stored, and when executed, cause a sending device or a chip applied in the sending device to perform step 101 and step 102 in the embodiments.

In still another aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, in which instructions are stored, and when executed, the instructions cause a sending device or a chip applied in the sending device to perform steps 203, 204, and 205 in the embodiments.

The aforementioned readable storage medium may include: u disk, removable hard disk, read only memory, random access memory, magnetic or optical disk, etc. for storing program codes.

In one aspect, a computer program product comprising instructions stored therein, which when executed, cause a receiving device or a chip applied in the receiving device to perform steps 103, 104, 105 and 106 in an embodiment is provided.

On the other hand, a computer program product is provided, which comprises instructions stored therein, which when executed, cause a receiving device or a chip applied in the receiving device to perform steps 201, 206, 207, 208, 209, 210 in the embodiments.

In yet another aspect, a computer program product comprising instructions stored therein, which when executed, cause a transmitting device or a chip applied in the transmitting device to perform steps 101 and 102 in an embodiment is provided.

In a further aspect, a computer program product is provided, which comprises instructions stored therein, which when executed, cause a sending device or a chip applied in the sending device to perform steps 203, 204, 205 in an embodiment.

In one aspect, a chip is provided, where the chip is applied to a receiving device, and the chip includes at least one processor and a communication interface, where the communication interface is coupled to the at least one processor, and the processor is configured to execute instructions to perform steps 103, 104, 105, and 106 in the embodiments.

In another aspect, a chip is provided, where the chip is applied to a receiving device, and the chip includes at least one processor and a communication interface, where the communication interface is coupled to the at least one processor, and the processor is configured to execute instructions to perform steps 201, 206, 207, 208, 209, and 210 in the embodiments.

In one aspect, a chip is provided, where the chip is applied to a transmitting device, and the chip includes at least one processor and a communication interface, where the communication interface is coupled to the at least one processor, and the processor is configured to execute instructions to perform step 101 and step 102 in the embodiments.

In another aspect, a chip is provided, where the chip is applied to a transmitting device, and the chip includes at least one processor and a communication interface, where the communication interface is coupled to the at least one processor, and the processor is configured to execute instructions to perform steps 203, 204, and 205 in the embodiments.

In the above embodiments, the implementation may be wholly or partially realized by software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof. When implemented using a software program, 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. The procedures or functions according to the embodiments of the present application are all or partially generated when the computer program instructions are loaded and executed on a computer. 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 via wire (e.g., coaxial cable, fiber optic, Digital Subscriber Line (DSL), for short) or wireless (e.g., infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.). The computer-readable storage medium can be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer or can comprise one or more data storage devices, such as a server, a data center, etc., that can be integrated with the medium. The usable medium may be a magnetic medium (e.g., floppy disk, hard disk, magnetic tape), an optical medium (e.g., DVD), or a semiconductor medium (e.g., Solid State Disk (SSD)), among others.

While the present application has been described in connection with various embodiments, other variations to the disclosed embodiments can be understood and effected by those skilled in the art in practicing the claimed application, from a review of the drawings, the disclosure, and the appended claims. In the claims, the word "comprising" does not exclude other elements or steps, and the word "a" or "an" does not exclude a plurality. A single processor or other unit may fulfill the functions of several items recited in the claims. The mere fact that certain measures are recited in mutually different dependent claims does not indicate that a combination of these measures cannot be used to advantage.

Although the present application has been described in conjunction with specific features and embodiments thereof, it will be evident that various modifications and combinations can be made thereto without departing from the spirit and scope of the application. Accordingly, the specification and figures are merely exemplary of the present application as defined in the appended claims and are intended to cover any and all modifications, variations, combinations, or equivalents within the scope of the present application. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various changes and modifications may be made in the present application without departing from the spirit and scope of the application. Thus, if such modifications and variations of the present application fall within the scope of the claims of the present application and their equivalents, the present application is also intended to include such modifications and variations.

Claims

1. A method of determining an angle of arrival of a signal, comprising:

the receiving equipment sequentially switches a plurality of receiving wave beams to receive the reference signals which are sent by the sending equipment on the reference signal resources and are the same for a plurality of times, and a plurality of received signals are obtained; the beam directions of the plurality of receiving beams are different, and the beam directions of the plurality of receiving beams correspond to the multiple reference signals one by one;

the receiving equipment performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain received signal matrixes corresponding to the multiple received signals;

the receiving equipment performs beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix;

and the receiving equipment determines the signal arrival angle of the transmitting equipment according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving device performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals, and comprises:

the receiving device determines at least one receiving beam from the plurality of receiving beams according to the signal parameters of the plurality of receiving beams;

The receiving equipment determines at least one receiving signal corresponding to the at least one receiving beam according to the at least one receiving beam;

and the receiving equipment performs digital signal processing on the at least one received signal and determines a received signal matrix corresponding to the at least one received signal as a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals.

3. The method of claim 1 or 2, wherein the beam directions of the plurality of receive beams are determined by a switched beam codebook, the switched beam codebook comprises one or more columns of beamforming vectors, each column of beamforming vectors in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors corresponds to a set of phase shift values of the phase shifter, and each column of beamforming vectors is used for determining the beam direction of one receive beam.

4. The method according to claim 3, wherein the array antenna architecture of the receiving device is an analog beamforming architecture, and the receiving device sequentially switches each beamforming vector in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors to adjust the beam direction of the receiving beam corresponding to each beamforming vector.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the array antenna architecture of the receiving device is a hybrid beamforming architecture, and each column of beamforming vectors further corresponds to a set of digital beamforming weights; and the receiving equipment sequentially switches at least one row of beam forming vectors in the one or more rows of beam forming vectors so as to adjust the beam direction of the receiving beam corresponding to the at least one row of beam forming vectors.

6. The method of any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the determining, by the receiving device, the signal arrival angle of the transmitting device according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm comprises:

the receiving equipment obtains one or more angles to be evaluated according to the target angle range;

the receiving equipment calculates an evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated in the one or more angles to be evaluated according to the beam mapping matrix;

and the receiving equipment determines an angle to be evaluated corresponding to a peak evaluation index in one or more evaluation indexes as the signal arrival angle.

7. The method according to claim 6, wherein the calculating, by the receiving device, an evaluation index corresponding to each of the one or more angles to be evaluated according to the beam mapping matrix comprises:

the receiving device is according to the formula

Calculating an evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated;

wherein the content of the first and second substances,

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the receiving device performs a beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix, resulting in a beam mapping matrix, comprising:

the receiving equipment obtains the beam mapping matrix according to the received signal matrix and the coefficient related to the angle to be evaluated; wherein the coefficients relating to the angle to be evaluated

Wherein a (θ) represents an array response vector corresponding to the direction to be evaluated,

a b-th column representing a virtual beam codebook,

b is greater than 1 and less than or equal to the number of the multiple reference signalsAnd the virtual beam codebook meets the condition that different column vectors are mutually orthogonal.

9. The method according to any of claims 4-8, wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using frequency division multiple access, FDMA, or orthogonal frequency division multiple access, OFDMA, techniques, and wherein the method further comprises, before the receiving device performs digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals: the receiving device converts the multiple received signals from the time domain to the frequency domain.

10. The method according to any one of claims 4-8, wherein said transmitting device and said receiving device communicate using carrier sense multiple access, CSMA, technology or time division multiple access, TDMA technology, and said receiving device sequentially switches a plurality of receive beams to receive a same reference signal transmitted by the transmitting device a plurality of times on a reference signal resource, resulting in a plurality of received signals, comprising:

and the receiving equipment receives the multiple same reference signals sent by the sending equipment on the reference signal resource by sequentially switching the beam directions of the multiple receiving beams and adopting a time domain sampling signal method to obtain the multiple receiving signals.

11. The method according to any one of claims 1-10, further comprising:

and the receiving equipment sends a control signaling to the sending equipment, wherein the control signaling is used for determining the reference signal resource configured for the sending equipment and the repetition times of the reference signal sent in the reference signal resource.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) or Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) techniques, and wherein the reference signal resources are orthogonal in frequency domain to reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for other transmitting devices;

The transmitting device and the receiving device adopt Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA) technology communication or Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) technology communication, and the time domain of the reference signal resource is different from the time domain of the reference signal resource configured for other transmitting devices by the receiving device.

13. A method of determining an angle of arrival of a signal, comprising:

the method comprises the steps that a sending device determines reference signal resources and the repetition times of reference signals sent in the reference signal resources;

and the sending equipment sends the same reference signal to the receiving equipment for multiple times on the reference signal resource according to the repetition times, wherein the multiple reference signals are used for calculating the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the transmitting device determines a number of repetitions of a reference signal resource and a reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource, comprising:

the sending device receives a control signaling from the receiving device, where the control signaling is used to determine the reference signal resource configured for the sending device and the repetition number of the reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resource.

15. The method according to claim 14, wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using frequency division multiple access FDMA technology or orthogonal frequency division multiple access OFDMA technology, and the frequency domain resource where the reference signal resource is located is orthogonal to the frequency domain resource where the reference signal resource configured for other transmitting devices by the receiving device is located;

The transmitting equipment and the receiving equipment adopt Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA) technology communication or Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) technology communication, and the time domain resource of the reference signal resource is different from the time domain resource of the reference signal resource configured for other transmitting equipment by the receiving equipment.

16. A communication apparatus, wherein the apparatus is a receiving device or a chip in the receiving device, the apparatus comprising:

the communication interface is used for sequentially switching multiple times of same reference signals sent by the multiple receiving beam receiving and sending devices on the reference signal resources to obtain multiple times of receiving signals; the beam directions of the plurality of receiving beams are different, and the beam directions of the plurality of receiving beams correspond to the multiple reference signals one by one;

the processor is used for performing digital signal processing on the multiple received signals to obtain a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals;

the processor is configured to perform a beam mapping operation on all signal elements in the received signal matrix to obtain a beam mapping matrix;

and the processor is used for determining the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment according to the beam mapping matrix and a preset algorithm.

17. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the processor is specifically configured to determine at least one receive beam from the plurality of receive beams according to the signal parameters of the plurality of receive beams, and to determine at least one receive signal corresponding to the at least one receive beam according to the at least one receive beam; and the receiving module is specifically configured to perform digital signal processing on the at least one received signal, and determine a received signal matrix corresponding to the at least one received signal as a received signal matrix corresponding to the multiple received signals.

18. The apparatus of claim 16 or 17, wherein the beam directions of the plurality of receive beams are determined by a switched beam codebook, the switched beam codebook comprises one or more columns of beamforming vectors, each column of beamforming vectors in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors corresponds to a set of phase shift values of the phase shifter, and each column of beamforming vectors is used for determining a beam direction of one receive beam.

19. The apparatus according to claim 18, wherein the array antenna architecture of the receiving device is an analog beamforming architecture, and the communication interface is specifically configured to switch each beamforming vector in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors in sequence to adjust a beam direction of a receiving beam corresponding to each beamforming vector in the one or more columns of beamforming vectors.

20. The apparatus of claim 18, wherein the array antenna architecture of the receiving device is a hybrid beamforming architecture, and each column of beamforming vectors further corresponds to a set of digital beamforming weights; the communication interface is specifically configured to sequentially switch at least one of the one or more columns of beamforming vectors to adjust a beam direction of a receive beam corresponding to the at least one column of beamforming vectors.

21. The apparatus according to any one of claims 16 to 20, wherein the processor is specifically configured to obtain one or more angles to be evaluated according to a target angle range, and to calculate an evaluation index corresponding to each of the one or more angles to be evaluated according to the beam mapping matrix; and determining the angle to be evaluated corresponding to the peak evaluation index in the one or more evaluation indexes as the angle of arrival of the signal.

22. The apparatus of claim 21, wherein the processor is specifically configured to operate according to a formula

Calculating an evaluation index corresponding to each angle to be evaluated;

wherein the content of the first and second substances,

s (θ) denotes a feature vector construction noise subspace, S (θ), and q_B-L(θ),...，q_B(θ)]，

23. The apparatus according to claim 22, wherein the processor is specifically configured to derive the beam mapping matrix according to the received signal matrix and a coefficient related to an angle to be evaluated; wherein the coefficients relating to the angle to be evaluated

a b-th column representing a virtual beam codebook,

24. The apparatus of any of claims 19-23, wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using a frequency division multiple access, FDMA, technique or an orthogonal frequency division multiple access, OFDMA, technique, and wherein the processor is further configured to convert the multiple received signals from a time domain to a frequency domain.

25. The apparatus according to any of the claims 19-23, wherein said transmitting device and said receiving device communicate using carrier sense multiple access, CSMA, technology or time division multiple access, TDMA technology, and wherein said communication interface is configured to obtain said multiple received signals by sequentially switching beam directions of said multiple received beams and by receiving multiple times the same reference signal transmitted on said reference signal resource by said transmitting device using a time-domain sampling signal method.

26. The apparatus of any one of claims 16-25, wherein the communication interface is further configured to send control signaling to the sending device, and wherein the control signaling is used to determine the reference signal resources configured for the sending device and the number of repetitions of the reference signal sent in the reference signal resources.

27. The apparatus of claim 26, wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate using Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) or Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) techniques, and wherein the reference signal resources are orthogonal in frequency domain to reference signal resources configured by the receiving device for other transmitting devices;

28. A communication apparatus, wherein the apparatus is a transmitting device or a chip in the transmitting device, the apparatus comprising:

a processor for determining a reference signal resource and a number of repetitions of a reference signal transmitted at the reference signal resource;

And the communication interface is used for sending the same reference signal to the receiving equipment for multiple times on the reference signal resource according to the repetition times, and the multiple reference signals are used for calculating the signal arrival angle of the sending equipment.

29. The apparatus of claim 28, wherein the communication interface is further configured to receive control signaling from the receiving device, and wherein the control signaling is used to determine the reference signal resources configured for the sending device and the number of repetitions of the reference signal transmitted in the reference signal resources.

30. The apparatus according to claim 28 or 29, wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device communicate by using frequency division multiple access FDMA technique or orthogonal frequency division multiple access OFDMA technique, and the frequency domain resource where the reference signal resource is located is orthogonal to the frequency domain resource where the reference signal resource configured by the receiving device for other transmitting devices is located;

31. A communication system, the communication system comprising: a receiving device and at least one transmitting device in communication with the receiving device, wherein the receiving device is configured to perform the method of any one of claims 1-12; the transmitting device is adapted to perform the method of any of claims 13-15.