CN115209398A

CN115209398A - Message transmission method and device

Info

Publication number: CN115209398A
Application number: CN202110393327.XA
Authority: CN
Inventors: 谢春生; 韩文勇; 丁辉; 周凯
Original assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2021-04-13
Filing date: 2021-04-13
Publication date: 2022-10-18
Also published as: WO2022218020A1

Abstract

The application discloses a message transmission method and a device, wherein the method comprises the following steps: the SMF receives a UE session establishment request initiated by UE, and determines that the established UE session signs a subscription to redundant transmission according to redundant transmission parameters in subscription information of the UE; the signed redundant transmission is used for indicating that the first UE session and the second UE session are mutually redundant transmission; selecting the same UPF for the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission parameters, and issuing configuration parameters to the UPF; the configuration parameters are used for indicating the UPF to perform duplicate removal, duplication and forwarding on messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode; sending a response message to the terminal side equipment; wherein, the response message includes the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode. The communication method and the communication device are used for improving the transmission reliability of the 3GPP service data.

Description

Message transmission method and device

Technical Field

The present application relates to the field of communications technologies, and in particular, to a method and an apparatus for transmitting a packet.

Background

In order to improve the stability of message transmission in the current 3GPP, a concept of redundant transmission is proposed; for example: an N3/N9 interface redundancy transmission scheme is defined in section 235015.33.2.2. According to the scheme, under the condition that the reliability of an N3/N9 single tunnel is insufficient, double N3 and N9 tunnels are established between an NG-radio access network (NG-RAN) and a User Plane Function (UPF) (including an I-UPF (Intermediate UPF) and an A-UPF (Anchor UPF)) so as to improve the reliability of data transmission. In the scheme, an NG-RAN copies an uplink message, distributes the same message serial number for the uplink redundant message obtained by copying the uplink message through an extended GTP-U (GPRS tunneling protocol-user, based on a message encapsulation user protocol), sends the uplink redundant message to a UPF (uplink packet flow) through two N3/N9 tunnels, and then the UPF is responsible for de-duplicating the uplink redundant message and then forwards the uplink redundant message. Certainly, after receiving the downlink message, the UPF copies the downlink message, allocates the same message serial number to the downlink redundant message obtained after copying the downlink message by expanding the GTP-U, and sends the downlink redundant message to the NG-RAN through the two N3/N9 tunnels, and the NG-RAN is responsible for de-duplicating the downlink redundant message and then forwards the downlink redundant message to the terminal side device.

According to the N3/N9 interface redundancy transmission scheme defined by the 3GPP 23501, although the transmission reliability of the N3/N9 tunnel is improved, the problem of the reliability of the N3/N9 interface is only solved; in the transmission path of the data message, the N3/N9 tunnel is only a part of the transmission path of the corresponding message, and the reliability of the wireless terminal device and the reliability of the air interface between the wireless terminal device and the base station still need to be solved.

Disclosure of Invention

The application provides a message transmission method and a message transmission device, which are used for improving the transmission reliability of 3GPP service data.

In a first aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a packet transmission method, where the method includes:

a session management network element (SMF) receives a UE session establishment request initiated by User Equipment (UE), and determines that the established UE session signs a redundant transmission according to a redundant transmission parameter in subscription information of the UE; wherein the UE comprises a first UE and a second UE; the UE sessions include a first UE session and a second UE session; the signed redundant transmission is used for indicating that the first UE session and the second UE session are mutually redundant transmission;

selecting the same UPF for the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission parameters, and issuing configuration parameters to the UPF; the configuration parameters are used for indicating the UPF to perform duplicate removal on the uplink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to a redundant transmission indication and a redundant mode; the message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in the downlink is subjected to redundancy replication, and the redundancy message obtained by redundancy replication is sent to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode indicates the mode of the message as a redundancy message;

sending a response message for completing the establishment of the UE session to the terminal side equipment; wherein the response message includes the redundant transmission indication and the redundancy mode.

The method provided by the embodiment of the application realizes the redundant transmission of the data message through the double-UE double-PDU path, solves the problems of single-point reliability and air interface reliability of equipment, and improves the reliability of 3GPP service data transmission.

In one possible design, the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the first UE includes the redundant transmission indication, a UE identity, a pair UE identity, the redundant mode, a slice identity, and data network name information; wherein the UE identity is used for indicating a unique identifier of the first UE; the pair UE identity is used for indicating a unique identifier of the second UE; the slice identifier is used for indicating a network slice accessed when the first UE performs redundancy transmission; the data network name is used for indicating a data network accessed when the first UE carries out redundancy transmission.

In one possible design, the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the first UE are the same as the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the second UE.

In one possible design, the redundancy means includes a first means and a second means; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet.

Based on the possible design, the method provided by the embodiment of the application adds the first extension field in the SDAP protocol, so that the first extension field carries redundant information of the redundant message, and the equipment receiving the redundant message can identify the redundant message according to the first extension field; and further, the message redundant transmission processing of the SDAP protocol type can be supported.

And adding a second extension field in the Ethernet message, and carrying redundant information of the redundant message through the second extension field, thereby supporting the redundant transmission of the Ethernet message.

In one possible design, the redundancy information includes a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy flag; wherein, different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identifications are the redundant messages.

In a possible design, the issuing configuration parameters to the UPF further includes:

indicating a first UE session or a second UE session to be configured as a first redundancy processing session, wherein the first redundancy processing session is used for carrying out de-duplication on uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which reach the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink manner, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or

The UPF is instructed to establish a first redundancy processing session, the first redundancy processing session is used for carrying out duplication elimination on uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which reach the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink mode, and sending redundancy messages obtained through redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or

If the first UE session and the second UE session belong to the same 5G VN Group session, indicating that the 5G VN Group session is configured as a first redundancy processing session, wherein the first redundancy processing session is used for de-duplicating uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which downlink reach the first UE session or the second UE session, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In a second aspect, an implementation procedure based on the UPF in an embodiment of the present application further provides another message transmission method, including:

a user plane network element UPF receives a configuration parameter issued by a session management network element SMF;

according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode in the configuration parameters, the uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session are subjected to duplicate removal; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

and performing redundancy replication on a downlink message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink manner, and sending the downlink redundancy message obtained by redundancy replication to the corresponding first UE and second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In one possible design, the redundancy information includes a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy flag; wherein, different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identification are the redundant messages.

In a possible design, when the redundancy mode is the first mode, the deduplication of the uplink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session includes:

receiving an uplink GTP-U message of the first UE or the second UE from the NG-RAN; acquiring the redundant information from a first extension field of a message header of the uplink GTP-U message;

de-duplicating the uplink GTP-U messages with the same redundant identification;

the redundancy copying is carried out on the downlink message which reaches the first UE conversation or the second UE conversation in the downlink, and the downlink redundancy message obtained by redundancy copying is sent to the corresponding first UE and the second UE through the first UE conversation and the second UE conversation, and the redundancy copying comprises the following steps:

receiving a downlink message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink manner, copying the downlink message, and generating redundant information according to the first redundant mode;

packaging the downlink message obtained by copying into a downlink GTP-U message; wherein, the first extension field of the message header of the downlink GTP-U message comprises the same redundant information;

sending the downlink GTP-U message to the NG-RAN; the redundant information indicates the NG-RAN to package the redundant information in the downlink GTP-U message to a downlink SDAP message and is sent to corresponding first UE and second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the redundant information is carried in a first extension field of a message header of the downlink SDAP message.

In a possible design, when the redundancy mode is the second mode, the performing duplicate removal on the uplink redundancy packet of the first UE session and the second UE session includes:

receiving an uplink Ethernet message sent by the first UE or the second UE, and acquiring redundant information from a second extended field of the uplink Ethernet message; carrying out duplication elimination on uplink Ethernet messages with the same redundancy identification;

the redundancy copying the message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in the downlink direction, and sending the redundancy message obtained by the redundancy copying to the corresponding first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session comprises:

receiving a downlink message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink manner, copying the downlink message, generating redundant information according to the second redundancy mode, and obtaining a downlink Ethernet message according to the copied downlink message; wherein, the downlink Ethernet message comprises the same redundant information, and the redundant information is carried in the second extension field of the downlink Ethernet message;

and sending the downlink Ethernet message to the corresponding first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In a third aspect, an implementation procedure based on a terminal side device in this embodiment further provides another packet transmission method, including:

the terminal side equipment initiates a creating request for creating the UE session;

receiving a response message fed back by the network side equipment based on the creation request; wherein, the response message comprises a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy mode; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode, the duplicate removal is carried out on the downlink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other;

and performing redundancy replication on the uplink message of the first UE session or the second UE session, and sending the uplink redundancy message obtained by redundancy replication to network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In one possible design, when the redundancy mode is the first mode, the deduplication of the downlink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode includes:

receiving downlink SDAP messages of a first UE session and a second UE session, acquiring redundant information in the downlink SDAP messages, and removing duplication of the downlink SDAP messages with the same redundant identification;

the redundancy copying is carried out on the uplink message of the first UE conversation or the second UE conversation, and the uplink redundancy message obtained by redundancy copying is sent to network side equipment through the first UE conversation and the second UE conversation, and the method comprises the following steps:

before sending an uplink message, copying the uplink message and generating redundant information corresponding to the uplink message; the redundancy identifiers corresponding to the two uplink messages formed by copying are the same;

and when the uplink message formed by copying is packaged into an uplink SDAP message, carrying the redundant information in a first extension field of a message header of the uplink SDAP message, and sending the packaged uplink SDAP message to network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In a possible design, when the redundancy mode is the second mode, the deduplication of the downlink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode includes:

receiving downlink Ethernet messages of a first UE session and a second UE session, and acquiring redundant information from a second extended field of the downlink Ethernet messages; carrying out duplication elimination on downlink Ethernet messages with the same redundancy identification;

when the uplink message formed by copying is packaged into an uplink Ethernet message, carrying the redundant information in a second extension field of the uplink Ethernet message;

and sending the encapsulated uplink Ethernet message to network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In a fourth aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a session management network element, including:

a receiving and sending unit, configured to receive a UE session creation request initiated by a user equipment UE;

the processing unit is used for determining that the created UE session signs the redundant transmission according to the redundant transmission parameters in the subscription information of the UE; wherein the UE comprises a first UE and a second UE; the UE session comprises a first UE session and a second UE session; the signed redundant transmission is used for indicating that the first UE session and the second UE session are mutually redundant transmission;

the processing unit is further configured to select the same UPF for the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission parameter, and issue a configuration parameter to the UPF; the configuration parameters are used for indicating the UPF to perform duplicate removal on the uplink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to a redundant transmission indication and a redundant mode; the message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in the downlink is subjected to redundancy replication, and the redundancy message obtained by redundancy replication is sent to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode indicates the mode of the message as a redundancy message;

the receiving and sending unit is further configured to send a response message to the terminal side device, where the response message completes creation of the UE session; wherein, the response message includes the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode.

In a possible design, the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the first UE are the same as the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the second UE.

In a possible design, the processing unit is further configured to indicate that a first UE session or a second UE session is configured as a first redundancy processing session, where the first redundancy processing session deduplicates uplink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session, performs redundancy replication on a packet that arrives at the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink, and sends a redundancy packet obtained by redundancy replication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or

The UPF is instructed to establish a first redundancy processing session, the first redundancy processing session is used for carrying out duplication removal on uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which reach the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink mode, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or

In a fifth aspect, an embodiment of the present application further provides a user plane network element, including:

a receiving and sending unit, configured to receive a configuration parameter sent by a session management network element SMF;

a processing unit, configured to perform deduplication on uplink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode in the configuration parameters; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

In one possible design, the redundancy means includes a first means and a second means; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is set in a second extended field of the Ethernet message; the redundant information comprises a redundant transmission indication and a redundant identification; different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identifications are the redundant messages.

In a possible design, when the redundancy mode is the first mode, the processing unit is specifically configured to:

the redundancy copying is carried out on the downlink message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in the downlink, and the downlink redundancy message obtained by redundancy copying is sent to the corresponding first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session, and the redundancy copying comprises the following steps:

In a possible design, when the redundancy mode is the second mode, the processing unit is specifically configured to:

the redundancy copying the message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in the downlink, and sending the redundancy message obtained by redundancy copying to the corresponding first UE and second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session comprises:

In a sixth aspect, an embodiment of the present application further provides a terminal side device, including:

a transceiver unit, configured to initiate a creation request for creating a UE session, and receive a response message fed back by a network side device based on the creation request; wherein, the response message comprises a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy mode; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

a processing unit, configured to perform deduplication on downlink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other; and performing redundancy replication on the uplink message of the first UE session or the second UE session, and sending the uplink redundancy message obtained by redundancy replication to network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session.

the removing the duplicate of the downlink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode comprises:

before sending an uplink message, copying the uplink message and generating redundant information corresponding to the uplink message; wherein, the redundancy identifications corresponding to the two uplink messages formed by copying are the same;

the redundancy copying is carried out on the uplink message of the first UE conversation or the second UE conversation, and the uplink redundancy message obtained by redundancy copying is sent to the network side equipment through the first UE conversation and the second UE conversation, and the method comprises the following steps:

In a seventh aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication apparatus, including: at least one processor; and a memory communicatively coupled to the at least one processor, a communication interface;

the communication interface is used for receiving signals from other communication devices except the communication device and transmitting the signals to the processor or sending the signals from the processor to other communication devices except the communication device; the memory stores instructions executable by the at least one processor, the at least one processor causing the communication device to perform any one of the above aspects or any one of the above methods by executing the instructions stored by the memory.

In an eighth aspect, an embodiment of the present application provides a communication system, where the communication system includes a terminal side device, a session management function network element, and a user plane network element;

wherein the session management function network element is configured to perform any one of the methods of the first aspect or the first aspect; the user plane network element is configured to perform any one of the methods of the second aspect or the second aspect, and the terminal device is configured to perform any one of the methods of the third aspect or the third aspect.

In a ninth aspect, the present application provides a computer readable storage medium having stored thereon a computer program or instructions which, when run on a communication device, causes the communication device to perform the method of any one of the possible designs of the above aspects.

In a tenth aspect, the present application provides a computer program product comprising a computer program or instructions which, when read and executed by a communication device, causes the communication device to perform the method of any one of the possible designs of the above aspects.

In an eleventh aspect, the present application provides a chip comprising a processor coupled with a memory for reading and executing a software program stored in the memory to implement the method in any one of the possible designs of the above aspects.

For technical effects that can be achieved by any one of the fourth to eleventh aspects, reference may be made to the description of the advantageous effects in the first to third aspects, and details are not repeated here.

Drawings

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a 5G network architecture;

fig. 2 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication system to which the message transmission method according to the embodiment of the present application is applied;

fig. 3 is a schematic flowchart of a message transmission method according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 4 is a schematic diagram illustrating an implementation of UPF processing an uplink packet and a downlink packet in the method provided in the present application;

fig. 5 and fig. 6 are schematic diagrams illustrating message processing performed by two different types of redundant sessions in the method provided by the present application;

fig. 7 is a schematic flow chart illustrating a process of implementing redundant packet processing by a UPF in the method provided by the present application;

FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating a first setting of an extension field in the method provided by the present application;

FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram of a network architecture for data packet processing using the method provided in the present application;

FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating a second method for setting an extension field according to the present application;

fig. 11 is a schematic structural diagram of a session management network element provided in the present application;

fig. 12 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication device provided in the present application.

Detailed Description

The present application will be described in further detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

This application is intended to present various aspects, embodiments or features around a system that may include a number of devices, components, modules, and the like. It is to be understood and appreciated that the various systems may include additional devices, components, modules, etc. and/or may not include all of the devices, components, modules etc. discussed in connection with the figures. Furthermore, a combination of these schemes may also be used.

In addition, in the embodiments of the present application, the word "exemplary" is used to mean serving as an example, instance, or illustration. Any embodiment or design described herein as "exemplary" is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other embodiments or designs. Rather, the term using examples is intended to present concepts 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 it can be known by a person of ordinary skill in the art that the technical solution provided in the embodiment of the present application is also applicable to similar technical problems with the evolution of the network architecture and the occurrence of a new service scenario.

First, terms of a part of the embodiments of the present application are explained so as to be easily understood by those skilled in the art.

1) A user equipment, also called a terminal side device, is a device having a wireless transceiving function, and may communicate with one or more Core Network (CN) devices (or may be called core devices) through an access network device (or may be called an access device) in a Radio Access Network (RAN).

A user device can also be called an access terminal, subscriber unit, subscriber station, mobile, remote station, remote terminal, mobile device, user terminal, user agent, or user equipment, etc. User equipment may be deployed on land, including indoors or outdoors, hand-held or vehicle-mounted; can also be deployed on the water surface (such as a ship and the like); and may also be deployed in the air (e.g., airplanes, balloons, satellites, etc.). The user equipment may be a cellular telephone (cellular phone), a cordless telephone, a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) phone, a smart phone (smart phone), a mobile phone (mobile phone), a Wireless Local Loop (WLL) station, a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), or the like. Alternatively, the user equipment may also be a handheld device with wireless communication functionality, a computing device or other device connected to a wireless modem, an in-vehicle device, a wearable device, a drone device or internet of things, a terminal in an in-vehicle network, a terminal of any modality in a fifth generation mobile communication (5 th-generation, 5G) network and future networks, a relay user equipment, a terminal in a PLMN for future evolution, or the like. The relay user equipment may be, for example, a 5G home gateway (RG). For example, the user equipment may be a Virtual Reality (VR) terminal, an Augmented Reality (AR) terminal, a wireless terminal in industrial control (industrial control), a wireless terminal in self driving (self driving), a wireless terminal in remote medical (remote medical), a wireless terminal in smart grid, a wireless terminal in transportation safety, a wireless terminal in smart city (smart city), a wireless terminal in smart home (smart home), and the like. The embodiment of the present application does not limit the type or category of the terminal device.

The user equipment may also include end-side equipment, such as a Local Switch (LSW), and/or Customer Premise Equipment (CPE).

In the embodiment of the present application, a User Equipment (UE) registered to a network may be understood as a user. One UE may correspond to one Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card, that is, when a terminal device is equipped with one SIM card, the terminal device corresponds to one UE, and when the terminal device is equipped with a plurality of SIM cards, the terminal device corresponds to a plurality of UEs.

2) The network device refers to a device that can provide a wireless access function for a terminal. Among other things, the network device may support at least one wireless communication technology, such as Long Term Evolution (LTE), new Radio (NR), wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA), and so on.

For example, the network device may comprise an access network device. Exemplary network devices include, but are not limited to: a next generation base station or a next generation node B (gNB) in the 5G network, an evolved node B (eNB), a Radio Network Controller (RNC), a Node B (NB), a Base Station Controller (BSC), a Base Transceiver Station (BTS), a home base station (e.g., home evolved node B or home node B, HNB), a Base Band Unit (BBU), a transceiving point (TRP), a Transmission Point (TP), a mobile switching center, a small station, a micro station, and the like. The network device may also be a wireless controller, a Centralized Unit (CU), and/or a Distributed Unit (DU) in a Cloud Radio Access Network (CRAN) scenario, or the network device may be a relay station, an access point, a vehicle-mounted device, a terminal, a wearable device, and a network device in future mobile communication or a network device in a public mobile land network (PLMN) for future evolution, and the like.

As another example, the network device may include a Core Network (CN) device, which includes, for example, an AMF or the like.

3) And the communication system is used for accessing the terminal equipment into the data network by adopting the third generation partnership project (3 GPP) access technology when the terminal equipment requests services, and realizing the transmission of data between the terminal equipment and the data network so as to realize corresponding services.

The communication system is divided into AN Access Network (AN) and a Core Network (CN). The access network is used to tandem the terminal devices into the core network via 3GPP access technologies. The core network is used for accessing the terminal equipment to different data networks. In addition, according to the logical function division, the core network can be divided into a control plane (signaling plane) and a user plane (data plane).

It should be further noted that the communication systems to which the message transmission method provided by the present application is applicable include a fifth generation (5 th generation,5 g) communication system (i.e., a New Radio (NR) communication system), a future new generation communication system, and the like.

For another example, in a 5G communication system, an access network may also be referred to as a 5G radio access network (NG-RAN), and a core network may also be referred to as a 5G core (5G core, 5gc).

4) AN Access Network (AN) device: the entity for transmitting and/or receiving signals on the network side is used as a device for accessing the terminal device to the wireless network in the communication system, and comprises a device for accessing the communication system in a wired mode or a wireless mode. A Radio Access Network (RAN) device accessing a communication system in a wireless manner may also be referred to as a base station, or a RAN node, or a RAN device in the NG-RAN. The RAN equipment may also coordinate the management of attributes for the air interface.

For example, the RAN device may be a new radio controller (NR controller), a gNode B (gNB) in a 5G system, a centralized network element (centralized unit), a new radio base station, a radio remote module, a micro base station (also called a small station), a relay (relay), a distributed network element (distributed unit), various macro base stations, a Transmission Reception Point (TRP), a Transmission Measurement Function (TMF), a Transmission Point (TP), or any other radio access device, or a base station in next-generation communication, but the embodiment of the present invention is not limited thereto.

5) The core network device is used for realizing the functions of the core network, such as being responsible for connecting the terminal device to different data networks according to a call request or a service request sent by the terminal device through an access network, and being responsible for services such as charging, mobility management, session management and the like.

6) And the PDU session is a service session for exchanging PDU data packets between the terminal equipment and the DN. A PDU session is implemented by establishing a PDU connection. In the embodiment of the present application, a PDU session is also referred to as a PDU UE session, or a UE session, or an ethernet session.

Optionally, the PDU session is bound to a "slice + DNN" combination, that is, the PDU session corresponds to a pair of slice + DNN information. Slices may be identified with a single network slice selection assistance information S-NSSAI. Alternatively, a PDU session is bound with a "slice + DNN + session identification (SessionID)" combination, i.e. a PDU session corresponds to a pair of slice + DNN and SessionID information. The SessionID is different for different PDU sessions, and the slice + DNN may be the same or different.

"and/or" in the present application, describing an association relationship of associated objects, means that there may be three relationships, for example, a and/or B, may mean: a exists alone, A and B exist simultaneously, and B exists alone. The character "/" generally indicates that the former and latter associated objects are in an "or" relationship.

The plural in the present application means two or more.

In addition, it is to be understood that the terms first, second, etc. in the description of the present application are used for distinguishing between the descriptions and not necessarily for describing a sequential or chronological order.

Next, a network scenario and a function module possibly involved in the network scenario involved in the present application are described, as shown in fig. 1, the 5G networking architecture may refer to a networking architecture defined in a 3gpp 23.501 protocol, and main functions of a function network element related to the architecture are described as follows:

application Function (AF) network element: also called application controller, is mainly used for transferring requirements of the application side on the network side, such as quality of service (QoS) requirements, user status event subscriptions, and the like. The AF network element may be an application function entity of a third-party application, or may be an application service deployed by an operator, such as an IMS voice call service. When the application function entity of the third-party application interacts with the core network, authorization processing may be performed through a network element with a network open function (NEF), for example, the application function entity of the third-party application directly sends a request message to the NEF network element, the NEF network element verifies whether the AF network element is allowed to send the request message, and if the request message passes the verification, the request message is forwarded to a corresponding Policy Control Function (PCF) network element or a unified data management function (UDM) network element.

PCF network element: the method is mainly used for realizing the policy control functions of charging, qoS bandwidth guarantee, mobility management, user equipment policy decision and the like aiming at the session and service flow levels.

UDM network element: the method is mainly used for realizing data management functions of subscription information management, user access authorization and the like.

Access and mobility management function (AMF) network elements: the method is mainly used for realizing the functions of mobility management, access authentication/authorization and the like of the terminal equipment. In addition, the AMF network element is also responsible for transferring the user policy between the terminal equipment and the PCF network element.

Session Management Function (SMF) network elements: the method is mainly used for performing Packet Data Unit (PDU) session management on the terminal equipment, executing control strategies issued by the PCF, selecting a User Plane Function (UPF) network element, allocating an IP address of the terminal equipment when the PDU type is an IP type, and the like.

UPF network element: the method is mainly used as an interface of terminal equipment and a data network to finish functions of user plane data forwarding, session/stream level-based charging statistics, bandwidth limitation and the like.

Unified Data Repository (UDR) network element: the UDR network element can be in interface interconnection with network elements such as UDM network element, PCF network element, NEF network element and the like so as to realize corresponding network element access or call.

Of course, other network elements besides the network elements illustrated above may also be included in the core network, and are not listed here.

It should be noted that, in the present application, names of corresponding network elements that implement each function are not limited, and other functions may also be implemented or merged with other functional network elements, and may also be referred to as other names.

In the 5G networking architecture shown in fig. 1, the main functions of some related communication interfaces between network elements and devices are described as follows:

an N1 interface: the interface is a signaling interface between the AMF network element and the terminal equipment, is irrelevant to an access network, is used for exchanging signaling messages between a core network and the terminal equipment, and can be used in the processes of registering the terminal equipment into the network, establishing PDU session by the terminal equipment, configuring terminal equipment strategies on a network side and the like.

An N2 interface: the interface between the AMF network element and the RAN device is used for transmitting radio bearer control information from the core network to the RAN device, and the like.

And the N3 interface is AN interface between the (R) AN equipment and the UPF network element and is used for transmitting the service data of the terminal equipment between the RAN equipment and the UPF network element.

And (4) interface N: the interface between the SMF network element and the UPF network element is used for transmitting information between a control plane and a user plane, and can be used for the flows of completing network access operation and the like by control plane terminal equipment according to subscription information of an operator.

An N6 interface: the UPF network element is an interface between the UPF network element and the DN and is used for transmitting the service data of the terminal equipment between the UPF network element and the DN.

An N7 interface: the interface between PCF network element and SMF network element is used for transmitting PDU conversation granularity and service data flow granularity control strategy.

An N8 interface: the interface between the AMF network element and the UDM network element is used for the AMF network element to acquire subscription information and authentication data related to access and mobility management from the UDM network element, and for the AMF network element to register the current mobility management related information of the terminal equipment to the UDM network element.

An N10 interface: the SMF network element is an interface between the SMF network element and the UDM network element, and is used for the SMF network element to acquire the subscription information related to session management from the UDM network element, and the SMF network element to register the current session related information of the terminal equipment to the UDM network element.

An N11 interface: the interface between the SMF network element and the AMF network element is used for transmitting PDU session tunnel information between the RAN equipment and the UPF network element, control information sent to the terminal equipment, radio resource control information sent to the RAN equipment and the like.

In order to describe the method provided in the embodiment of the present application in more detail, based on the description of the network architecture and the functional modules, the following further describes a PDU session establishment and a data packet forwarding scenario to which the method provided in the embodiment of the present application is applied:

the 5G network provides data switching services, referred to as PDU connect services, for the UE and the DN network (data network, identified as DNN). The UE obtains a PDU connection service by initiating a PDU session setup request to the mobile network. The network side provides PDU connection service by maintaining PDU sessions for the UE.

As shown in fig. 2, the UE transmits data to the DN through the (R) AN and the UPF (i.e., forms a traffic data exchange path between the UE and the DN network), which is a data traffic path (data plane path) of the UE in the mobile network. To realize data exchange between the UE and the DN network, the UE needs to establish a DNN-based PDU session (signaling plane flow) using a PDU connection service provided by the mobile network. The establishment of a PDU session involves two basic procedures: UE registers network access flow to mobile network, UE requests network to establish PDU conversation flow.

The general user registration and network access process can be described as follows: the UE sends a registration request to the AMF through the (R) AN, and the AMF obtains subscription information from a specific UDM according to the user identity. The network side finally confirms that the UE is allowed to access the network through a series of authentication and authorization operations, at the moment, the AMF responds to the UE registration request and issues related strategy information to the UE, and the UE completes network registration residence. And the network side AMF maintains the registration network access information of the UE and performs mobility management on the UE.

After the UE finishes registering and accessing the network, the UE can initiate a PDU session establishment request to acquire the PDU connection service of the network. The general PDU session establishment procedure can be described simply as: UE sends PDU conversation establishing request to AMF through RAN, AMF selects SMF to provide conversation service for UE, saves corresponding relation between SMF and PDU conversation, sends conversation establishing request to SMF, SMF selects corresponding UPF to establish user surface transmission path for UE, and distributes IP address for it.

In the PDU Session management process of UE, SMF interacts with UPF through N4 interface to control UPF to create, modify and delete corresponding UE N4 Session (N4 Session/PFCP Session) to realize the control of UPF processing data message. And the SMF issues various data packet processing rules to the UE N4 session in the UPF to complete the control of processing the data packet by the UPF. After receiving the external data message, the UPF performs message matching according to a Packet Detection Rule (PDR) issued by the SMF, and forwards the message according to a Forwarding Rule (FAR).

For ease of understanding, the PDR and FAR will be briefly described as follows:

and the PDR is issued to the UPF by the SMF in the PDU session management process, and the UPF executes the corresponding data packet matching rule according to the PDR issued by the SMF and obtains the corresponding FAR completion packet forwarding. One PDR comprises one PDI parameter, and the PDI parameter comprises one or a plurality of matching fields and is used for matching with the data message received by the UPF, identifying the message and finishing the association of the data message and the N4 conversation. The SMF provides the UPF with PDI information mainly as follows:

data message ingress (Source Interface).

A series of parameters for matching the ingress packets, such as: tunnel endpoint (Local F-TEID), network Instance (Network Instance), UE IP address, service data flow Filter (SDF filters (s)) or Application ID (Application ID), etc.

After receiving a data message, the UPF matches each field of the data message header with a parameter item defined by PDI in the PDR, finds out N4 conversation to which the message belongs and PDR rules with the highest priority matching relation with the data message in the N4 conversation, and completes message matching. After PDR matching is completed, the PDR rule contains corresponding FAR indication, and the UPF completes data message forwarding according to the FAR indication. Wherein, the FAR instructs the UPF to perform data message processing mainly by the following information:

an application Action Parameter (application Action Parameter) for indicating whether the UPF needs to forward, copy, discard the packet, or cache the downlink packet in a manner of notifying or not notifying a control plane (such as SMF), or indicating whether the UPF allows the UE to join the IP multicast group;

forwarding, caching, replication parameters that the UPF needs to use when the application action instructs the UPF to forward, cache, or replicate packets.

On the basis of the PDU session establishment and data packet forwarding scenarios, embodiments of the present application provide a packet transmission method and apparatus, in which the method stores subscription information of two UEs performing subscription redundancy pair transmission on a network side in advance, and defines how to instruct redundancy processing and a manner of performing redundancy packet processing, so that a terminal device and a network side device can perform processing such as deduplication, replication, and forwarding on a redundancy packet according to the defined manner. Based on the management, establishment and usage flow of the PDU session in the prior art, the method provided by the embodiment of the present application is further described in detail by combining the specific examples as follows:

first, in this embodiment of the present application, subscription information of each user may be correspondingly generated according to a requirement of the user, and if the user subscribes to redundant transmission, that is, a first UE session and a second UE session respectively created by two different UEs (a first UE and a second UE) are mutually redundant transmission; the subscription information corresponding to the first UE and the second UE may include the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the redundant transmission; the redundant transmission parameters may specifically include:

a1, UE identification and pairing UE identification, which are used for indicating unique identifiers of two UEs that are in redundant transmission with each other; the UE identification is a unique identifier of a first UE in the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the first UE; the corresponding pair UE identity is then the unique identity of the UE that has subscribed to redundant transmission with the first UE, which in this example may be the unique identifier of the second UE. The unique Identifier for indicating the UE may be a UE Identifier such as a user Permanent Identifier (SUPI) or a Generic Public Subscription Identifier (GPSI); if the first UE and the second UE have signed up for redundant transmission, the UE identity in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the first UE may be UE1 SUPI; the corresponding pair of UE identities may be UE2 SUPI.

A2, a slice (S-NSSAI) identifier for indicating a network slice accessed by the UE during redundant transmission;

a3, data Network Name (DNN) information, configured to indicate a data network accessed when the first UE performs redundant transmission;

in this embodiment, in order to facilitate the first UE and the second UE to implement mutual redundant transmission, if two UEs are connected to sign mutual redundant transmission, the slice identifier and the data network name in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the two UEs are the same; for example: the first UE and the second UE have signed mutual redundant transmission, and the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the first UE are the same as the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the second UE.

A4, a redundant transmission indication for indicating whether to enable redundant transmission;

a5, a redundancy mode is a mode for indicating that the message is a redundancy message; in order to implement processing of redundant messages, both the terminal-side device and the network-side device need to identify and determine whether a transmitted message is a redundant transmission message through a mode, so as to perform operations such as duplicate removal, duplication, forwarding, and the like on the message. In the embodiment of the application, an extension field can be set in the message to carry redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message, and the selectable redundant modes can include a first mode and a second mode; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet.

In order to implement the scheme provided by the embodiment of the application, several attribute parameters including redundant transmission indication, pairing UE identification and redundant mode may be added on the basis of the original subscription information.

A specific example of the redundant transmission parameters is provided below, where if the first UE and the second UE are subscribed to redundant transmission, the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the first UE and the second UE are shown in table 1 below:

TABLE 1

Wherein, the redundant transmission parameter in the subscription information of the first UE is the content included in the first list item in the table 1; the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the second UE is the content corresponding to the second list item. As shown in table 1 above, the slice identifiers corresponding to the first UE and the second UE are both 1-010101; the data network name information is 5glan01; namely, the first UE and the second UE select the same network for access.

After the network side device sets the subscription information, in combination with the exemplary network architecture provided in fig. 1, a message transmission method provided in the embodiment of the present application may include, as shown in fig. 3, the following steps:

s301, UE initiates a PDU session establishment request;

if the UE is a UE subscribed to redundant transmission, the creation request may include session creation requests initiated by two UEs subscribed to redundant transmission; for example: and the first UE and the second UE sign a redundant transmission, the first UE and the second UE both initiate a session establishing request, respectively establish UE sessions, and then realize the sending of the redundant message in a manner that the two established UE sessions are mutually redundant transmission.

S302, the AMF determines that the UE subscribes to the redundant transmission according to the redundant transmission parameters carried in the subscription information corresponding to the UE, and the AMF selects the same SMF for the UE1/UE 2.

S303, the AMF interacts with the SMF to create a PDU session of the UE;

s304, the SMF acquires the subscription information of the UE, and determines that the created UE session subscribes redundant transmission according to the redundant transmission parameters in the subscription information; wherein the UE comprises a first UE and a second UE; the UE session comprises a first UE session and a second UE session; the signed redundant transmission is used for indicating that the first UE session and the second UE session are mutually redundant transmission; the SMF selects the same UPF for a first user equipment (UE 1 or called as a first UE) and a second user equipment (UE 2 or called as a second UE) to create an N4 session.

In this embodiment, based on the subscription information and the content included in the redundant transmission parameter content, after acquiring the subscription information of the UE, if acquiring a redundant transmission indication, a redundant mode, or a terminating UE identifier from the subscription information corresponding to the UE, the SMF may determine that the created UE session subscribes to redundant transmission.

S305, creating an N4 session corresponding to the UE;

s306, issuing configuration parameters to the UPF according to the redundant transmission parameters;

in order to comprehensively process the redundancy packets corresponding to the first UE session and the second UE session, the SMF selects the same UPF for the first UE session (in this embodiment, the N4 session corresponding to the first UE) and the second UE session (in this embodiment, the N4 session corresponding to the second UE);

the configuration parameter is used for indicating the UPF to carry out duplication elimination on the uplink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode; performing redundancy copy on a message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink manner, and sending a redundancy message obtained by redundancy copy to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode indicates the mode of the message being a redundancy message;

in this embodiment, because the redundant transmission is implemented by combining two UE pairs, two UEs may initiate session creation requests before and after each other, so as to successively establish two UE sessions implementing the redundant transmission, and therefore, a specific implementation manner when issuing configuration parameters for this case may be:

if the session creation request of the first UE is received, configuration parameters for redundancy transmission have not been issued to the UPF yet (that is, the UPF has not yet configured redundancy processing for both UE1 and UE 2), the SMF interacts with the UPF, and creates a redundancy processing function module (which may be in the form of a redundancy session, a function block, or the like), where the configuration parameters include: redundant transmission indication, UE N4 session identification (UE 1 session identification indicating a UE session for redundant transmission), a redundancy mode (e.g., SDAP extension), and a downlink rule (a message that arrives at UE1 downlink and is processed by a redundancy processing function module).

If the session creation request of the second UE is received, the configuration parameters for redundancy transmission have already been issued to the UPF (that is, the UPF has already configured redundancy processing for both UE1 and UE 2), the SMF interacts with the UPF to supplement the parameters of the UPF redundancy processing function module, and the configuration parameters issued this time may include: the redundancy transmission indication, the redundancy processing ID (ID of the functional module for realizing the redundancy processing; if the redundancy processing is realized, the session ID is the session ID), the UE N4 session identification (UE 2 session identification, indicating the UE session for performing the redundancy transmission), and the downlink rule (the message which arrives at the UE2 in the downlink is processed by the redundancy processing functional module).

S307, the SMF interacts with the UPF, and UE session forwarding rules are modified;

because the messages corresponding to the two sessions need to be deduplicated after the two UE sessions sign the redundant transmission, before forwarding the messages, the messages need to be deduplicated by a redundancy processing function module (in the form of a session or a function block, etc.) created by the UPF based on the configuration parameters, so that the forwarding rule for the messages of the UE sessions that sign the redundant transmission may be that the messages are forwarded to the redundancy processing function module for processing.

Based on the above example, in the process of creating a UE 1N 4 session and a UE 2N 4 session, if the SMF interacts with the UPF to establish a module implementing the redundancy processing function in the UPF as a redundancy session, the forwarding rule of the redundancy packet (including the uplink packet and the downlink packet) in the UPF may be as shown in fig. 4, and specifically, the process of implementing the redundancy processing of the data packet may be:

wherein: for the uplink message, the SMF configures UE1 session and UE2 session forwarding rules and forwards the uplink message to the redundant session. And the redundancy session completes the duplicate removal of the uplink redundancy message, forwards the message after the duplicate removal from the N6/N19 according to the destination address, and discards the message if the destination address does not forward the corresponding forwarding rule.

For downlink messages of UE1 session or UE2 session (for example, the redundant session receives N6/N19 downlink messages), the redundant session makes redundant copy on the messages, generates the same redundant identifier for the copied messages, and respectively forwards the data messages added with the redundant identifier to UE1 session and UE2 session. And the UE1 session and the UE2 session send messages from the N3/N9 port.

It should be noted that the redundant session shown in fig. 4 is a functional module for implementing the above method, that is, the specific implementation for the SMF to issue the configuration parameter to the UPF to implement the redundant transmission may have various forms, and the following are some implementation examples, and are not limited to these several ways:

the method comprises the steps that a first UE session or a second UE session is indicated to be configured as a first redundancy processing session, the first redundancy processing session is used for carrying out de-duplication on uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which downlink reach the first UE session or the second UE session, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session;

in this embodiment, the function of the redundant session may be integrated into the UE 1N 4 session, and when the UE 1N 4 session is established correspondingly, the SMF may issue the configuration parameters of the redundant session and the same parameters of the UE 1N 4 session to the UPF together, so that the UPF may establish the UE 1N 4 session having the redundancy processing function according to the configuration parameters. As shown in fig. 5, for the uplink packet and the downlink packet of the redundant transmission, the uplink packet and the downlink packet are correspondingly forwarded to the UE 1N 4 session for deduplication and duplication processing.

The UPF is instructed to establish a first redundancy processing session, the first redundancy processing session is used for removing duplication of uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, performing redundancy copying on messages which reach the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink mode, and sending redundancy messages obtained through redundancy copying to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the processing procedure of the uplink message and the downlink message of the redundant transmission in this embodiment is the same as that in fig. 4, and is not described here again.

And if the first UE session and the second UE session belong to the same 5G VN Group session, indicating that the 5G VN Group session is configured as a first redundancy processing session, wherein the first redundancy processing session is used for de-duplicating uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which downlink reach the first UE session or the second UE session, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session.

A 5G LAN service is defined at 3gpp 23.501 4.4.6, and a virtual mobile private Network is constructed for a user through the 5G LAN (5G Local Area Network) service in a mobile Network. The UE solves the data exchange problem between the UE and the DN network by establishing a conventional PDU connection. On the basis of traditional PDU connection, the 5GLAN adds a group concept, namely that the UE belonging to the same 5GLAN group can complete data exchange with a DN network corresponding to the group, and can also directly complete data exchange with other UEs in the group through UPF, and the UEs in the two groups are mutually isolated. Virtual private network communication is realized through 5 GLAN.

In this embodiment, if the first UE session and the second UE session belong to the same 5G VN Group session, the function of the redundant transmission processing may be integrated into the 5G VN Group session, and the forwarding rule of the redundant packet corresponding to the first UE session and the second UE session is forwarded to the 5G VN Group session processing. The specific packet forwarding process is shown in fig. 6.

S308, sending a response message for completing the establishment of the UE session to the terminal side equipment; wherein the response message includes the redundant transmission indication and the redundancy mode.

The terminal side equipment receives the response message fed back by the establishment request and performs duplicate removal on the downlink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other;

By the method shown in fig. 3, establishment and subscription of the SMF and UPF redundant transmission paths are completed, and processing rule setting of the redundant packet is realized (that is, a configuration parameter for realizing redundant packet processing is issued to the UPF); the UPF may implement the processing of the redundant packet according to the configuration parameter, and the specific implementation may be (as shown in fig. 7):

s701, a UPF receives configuration parameters issued by an SMF;

s702, the UPF processes the message of the redundant transmission according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode in the configuration parameters; the specific implementation can be as follows:

if the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other; carrying out duplicate removal on uplink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission indication and the redundant mode in the configuration parameters; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

In the embodiment of the present application, the redundancy method may include: the first mode and the second mode. In the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet. The redundant information comprises a redundant transmission indication and a redundant identification; different messages correspond to different redundancy identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundancy identification are the redundancy messages.

The following description is made with reference to specific examples to respectively describe two redundancy occurrences in the embodiments of the present application, and the specific implementation may be:

in the first mode, an extension field (i.e., a first extension field) is added to a packet header of a Service Data Adaptation Protocol (SDAP) packet to carry redundant information, so that a processing module receiving the redundant packet can determine that the packet is a redundant packet of redundant transmission according to a rule set in fig. 3, and perform corresponding processing. The first extension field may be arranged at the head of the SDAP Header as shown in FIG. 8, although the example in the figure is only a specific example, and the first extension field may be arranged at the position of the Header if it is implemented. Fig. 8 shows the frame formats of the SDAP Data PDU before and after the extension, where the extended SDAP message adds a message redundancy identification field (i.e., a first extension field) on the basis of the original SDAP Header, where the field includes the following attributes as shown in table 2 below (of course, the attributes of the field are not limited to the following two items):

TABLE 2

Based on the setting manner of the redundant information, the following describes in detail the uplink and downlink message processing flow of the redundant transmission in conjunction with the implementation scenario architecture shown in fig. 9, in the embodiment shown in fig. 9, a redundant transceiver module (redundant transceiver is a logic function module, which does not restrict the implementation of actual implementation, and may be independent of the UE, or may be in other forms) may be set at the terminal side to process the redundant message, and of course, in this embodiment, the device, the redundant transceiver module, and the UE1 and UE2 may all be collectively referred to as terminal-side device; the following specific implementation description takes the UE1 (or referred to as a first UE) and the UE2 (or referred to as a second UE) to perform redundancy transmission, and the UE1 and the UE2 establish a first UE session and a second UE session to perform redundancy transmission as an example:

1. processing flow of uplink message:

b1, before sending an uplink message, the equipment (the equipment can be equipment externally connected with the UE) sends the message to a redundant transceiver module, and then the redundant transceiver module copies the uplink message and generates redundant information corresponding to the uplink message; respectively sending the copied uplink message and the redundant information to UE1 and UE2; each UE receives a redundant message and a redundant message;

wherein, the redundant identifications (the redundant identifications can be message sequence numbers) corresponding to the two uplink messages formed by copying are the same;

b2, when the uplink message formed by copying is packaged into an uplink SDAP message by the UE1 and the UE2, carrying the redundant information in a first extension field of a message header of the uplink SDAP message, and respectively sending the packaged uplink SDAP message to network side equipment (NG-RAN) through a first UE session and a second UE session;

b3, after receiving the uplink SDAP message carrying the redundant information, the NG-RAN encapsulates the uplink SDAP message into an uplink GTP-U message, copies the redundant information carried in the uplink SDAP message to a message header extension field of the GTP-U message (the extension field can be an extension field which is originally set in the message header of the GTP-U message), and then sends the uplink GTP-U message to the UPF through the N3 port;

b4, the UPF receives an uplink GTP-U message of the first UE (UE 1) or the second UE (UE 2) from the NG-RAN; acquiring redundant information from a first extension field of a message header of an uplink GTP-U message;

and B5, removing the duplication of the uplink messages with the same redundancy identification, and then completing message forwarding according to the forwarding rule.

2. The processing flow of the downlink message is as follows:

c1, UPF (UPF 1 in fig. 9) receives a downlink message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink mode, copies the downlink message, and generates redundant information according to the first redundant mode;

c2, encapsulating the downlink message obtained by copying into a downlink GTP-U message; wherein, the first extension field of the message header of the two copied downlink GTP-U messages comprises the same redundant information;

c3, sending the two downlink GTP-U messages to the NG-RAN;

c4, when the NG-RAN packages the downlink GTP-U message into a downlink SDAP message; adding redundant information in a downlink GTP-U message into a first extension field of a message header of the downlink SDAP message; sending the downlink SDAP message to the UE through the first UE session and the second UE session;

and C5, the first UE session and the second UE session receive the SDAP message carrying the redundant information, respectively extract the redundant information of the SDAP message and the PDU data message, and respectively forward the redundant information and the PDU data message to the redundant transceiver module. And the redundant transceiving module completes redundant duplicate removal of the message according to the redundant information and forwards the data message after duplicate removal to the terminal equipment.

In the second mode, the second extension field of the Ethernet packet carries redundant information, so that the processing module receiving the redundant packet can determine that the packet is a redundant packet of redundant transmission according to the rule set in fig. 3, thereby performing corresponding processing on the redundant packet. In this embodiment, taking the formal standard 802.1Q of virtual bridged local area network as an example for defining the format of an Ethernet frame, a 2+n-byte redundant transmission extension field (i.e. a second extension field) is added between a Source MAC Address (SMAC) field and an 802.1Q Tag field, or between the 802.1Q Tag field and an LEN/Type field, and the Ethernet packet structure of the second extension field between the Source MAC Address (SMAC) field and the 802.1Q Tag field is shown in fig. 10. The second extension field may include 2 attributes (redundant transmission indication and message redundancy flag), and the specific explanation of each attribute is shown in table 3 below:

TABLE 3

Based on the above redundant information setting manner shown in fig. 10, the following describes in detail the uplink and downlink message processing flow of redundant transmission in conjunction with the implementation scenario architecture shown in fig. 9, in the embodiment shown in fig. 9, a terminal side may set a redundant transceiver module (redundant transceiver is a logic function module, which is not restricted to implement actual implementation, and may be independent of the UE, or may be in other forms) to process a redundant message, and of course, in this embodiment, the device, the redundant transceiver module, and UE1 and UE2 may all be collectively referred to as a terminal side device; the following description specifically implements the redundant transmission by taking the UE1 (or called as the first UE) and the UE2 (or called as the second UE) and the redundant transmission signed by the first UE session and the second UE session established by the UE1 and the UE2 as an example:

1. processing flow of uplink messages:

d1, equipment sends an uplink message to a redundant transceiving module, and before the redundant transceiving module sends the uplink message, the uplink message is copied and redundant information corresponding to the uplink message is generated; wherein, the redundant identifications (which may be message sequence numbers) corresponding to the two uplink messages formed by copying are the same;

d2, packaging the uplink message formed by copying into an uplink Ethernet message carrying redundant information, wherein the redundant information is carried in a second extension field of the uplink Ethernet message;

d3, sending the encapsulated uplink Ethernet message to network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session;

the redundant transceiving module may send the two identical uplink Ethernet packets obtained by copying to UE1 and UE2, and then UE1 and UE2 send the uplink Ethernet packets to the corresponding NG-RAN as PDU packets.

D4, the NG-RAN receives the PDU message of the UE and sends the message to the UPF through the N3 port.

D5, the UPF receives an uplink Ethernet message sent by the first UE or the second UE, and acquires redundant information from a second extended field of the uplink Ethernet message; carrying out duplication elimination on uplink Ethernet messages with the same redundancy identification;

after the uplink Ethernet message is deduplicated, the second extension field added in the uplink Ethernet message is also deleted, the message is restored into a common Ethernet message, and the common Ethernet message is forwarded to the N6/N19 port according to the forwarding rule to be sent away.

2. The processing flow of the downlink message is as follows:

e1, receiving a downlink message from a first UE session or a second UE session, copying the downlink message, generating redundancy information according to the second redundancy mode, and obtaining a downlink Ethernet message according to the copied downlink message by a UPF (UPF 1 in fig. 9); wherein, the downlink Ethernet message comprises the same redundant information, and the redundant information is carried in the second extension field of the downlink Ethernet message;

e2, sending the downlink Ethernet message to NG-RAN through the first UE session and the second UE session;

and E3, after receiving the downlink Ethernet message, the NG-RAN sends the downlink Ethernet message to the first UE and the second UE through an air interface.

E4, the redundancy transceiving module receives the downlink Ethernet messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, and acquires redundancy information from the second extension field of the downlink Ethernet message; carrying out duplication elimination on downlink Ethernet messages with the same redundancy identification;

the redundancy transceiving module also restores the deduplicated downlink Ethernet packet into a normal Ethernet packet (i.e. deletes the second extension field in the downlink Ethernet packet), and finally forwards the downlink Ethernet packet to the device.

In the first and second manners, the redundant transceiver module for illustration is a functional module for implementing part of the method of the present application, and the setting manner of the functional module may include multiple manners; for example, the redundant transceiver module and two UEs are packaged in one device, and the communication between the redundant transceiver module and the UEs may be function call in a software layer, interprocess communication, memory copy, etc., as long as the

UEs

1 and 2 can hand data messages and redundant information to the redundant module.

Or the redundant transceiver module and the UE1 and the UE2 are independent devices, that is, the UE1 and the UE2 need to send the data packet and the redundant information to the redundant transceiver module in an inter-device communication manner, and the data packet transmission between the UE and the redundant transceiver module can be performed in any optional transmission manner between the devices.

The method provided by the embodiment of the application realizes the redundant transmission of the data message through the double-UE double-PDU path, solves the problems of single-point reliability and air interface reliability of equipment, and improves the reliability of 3GPP service data transmission;

through the implementation scheme, the method provided by the embodiment of the application adds the first extension field in the SDAP protocol, so that the first extension field carries redundant information of the redundant message, and equipment receiving the redundant message can identify the redundant message according to the first extension field; and then the message redundancy transmission processing of the SDAP protocol type can be supported.

The scheme provided by the embodiment of the present application is introduced from the perspective of the terminal device, the network elements in the core network, such as SMF, UPF, and the like, and the interaction between the terminal device and the network elements. It is to be understood that, in order to implement the above functions, the terminal device and the core network element may include corresponding hardware structures and/or software modules for performing the respective functions. Those of skill in the art will 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 terminal device and the core network device may be divided into the functional units according to the above method example, for example, each functional unit may be divided corresponding to each function, or two or more functions may be integrated into one 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.

Based on the above embodiments, as shown in fig. 11, the session management network element provided in the present application may include a processing unit 1101, and may further include a transceiver unit 1102. The session management network element may be the session management network element in any of the embodiments described above.

As an implementation manner, the session management network element may further include a storage unit 1103 configured to store program codes and data of the session management network element.

The processing unit 1101 may be a processor or a controller, such as a general Central Processing Unit (CPU), a general purpose processor, a Digital Signal Processing (DSP), an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) 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. The processor may also be a combination of computing functions, e.g., comprising one or more microprocessors, DSPs, and microprocessors, among others.

The storage unit 1103 may be a memory. The transceiving unit 1102 is an interface circuit of the apparatus for receiving signals from other apparatuses. For example, when the apparatus is implemented in the form of a chip, the transceiving unit 1102 is an interface circuit of the chip for transmitting a signal to other chips or apparatuses and/or an interface circuit of the chip for receiving a signal from other chips or apparatuses.

In an embodiment, a specific implementation scheme of each functional module of the session management network element may be as follows:

the processing unit is further configured to select the same UPF for the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundant transmission parameter, and issue a configuration parameter to the UPF; the configuration parameters are used for indicating the UPF to perform duplicate removal on the uplink redundant messages of the first UE session and the second UE session according to a redundant transmission indication and a redundant mode; the message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in the downlink is subjected to redundancy replication, and the redundancy message obtained by redundancy replication is sent to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode indicates the mode of the message being a redundancy message;

the receiving and sending unit is further configured to send a response message to the terminal side device, where the response message completes creation of the UE session; wherein the response message includes the redundant transmission indication and the redundancy mode.

In a possible design, the processing unit is further configured to indicate that a first UE session or a second UE session is configured as a first redundancy processing session, where the first redundancy processing session deduplicates uplink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session, redundantly copies a packet that arrives at the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink direction, and sends a redundancy packet obtained by redundancy copying to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or alternatively

The UPF is instructed to establish a first redundancy processing session, the first redundancy processing session is used for carrying out duplication removal on uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which reach the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink mode, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or alternatively

In another embodiment, the present application further provides a fifth aspect, and an embodiment of the present application further provides a user plane network element, including:

and performing redundancy copy on a downlink message which reaches the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink manner, and issuing the downlink redundancy message obtained by redundancy copy to the corresponding first UE and second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session.

In one possible design, the redundancy means includes a first means and a second means; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a second extended field of the Ethernet message; the redundant information comprises a redundant transmission indication and a redundant identification; different messages correspond to different redundancy identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundancy identification are the redundancy messages.

and sending the downlink Ethernet message to the corresponding first UE and second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session.

The embodiment of the present application further provides a terminal side device, including:

a receiving and sending unit, configured to initiate a creation request for creating a UE session, and receive a response message fed back by a network side device based on the creation request; wherein, the response message comprises a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy mode; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

a processing unit, configured to perform deduplication on downlink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other; and performing redundancy copy on the uplink message of the first UE session or the second UE session, and sending the uplink redundancy message obtained by redundancy copy to network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session.

receiving downlink Ethernet messages of a first UE session and a second UE session, and acquiring redundant information from a second extended field of the downlink Ethernet messages; carrying out duplicate removal on downlink Ethernet messages with the same redundancy identification;

and sending the encapsulated uplink Ethernet message to the network side equipment through the first UE session and the second UE session.

Based on the foregoing embodiments, the present application further provides a communication apparatus, as shown in fig. 12, where the communication apparatus may be an implementation manner of a hardware circuit of the communication apparatus shown in the session management network element, the user plane network element, and the terminal side device. The communication device may be adapted to perform the functions of the terminal equipment or the SMF or UPF in the above described method embodiments. For convenience of explanation, fig. 12 shows only the main components of the communication apparatus.

As shown in fig. 12, communications apparatus 1200 includes at least one processor 1201, and memory 1202.

The processor 1201 is configured to execute instructions or programs stored in the memory 1202. When the instructions or programs stored in the memory 1202 are executed, the processor 1201 is configured to perform the operations performed by the processing unit 1101 in the above-described embodiment, and the communication interface 1203 is configured to perform the operations performed by the transceiver unit 1102 in the above-described embodiment.

The memory 1202 is used for storing program instructions and/or data. The memory 1202 is coupled to the processor 1201. The coupling in the embodiments of the present application is an indirect coupling or a communication connection between devices, units or modules, and may be an electrical, mechanical or other form for information interaction between the devices, units or modules. The processor 1201 may operate in conjunction with the memory 1202. The processor 1201 may execute program instructions stored in the memory 1202. At least one of the at least one memory may be included in the processor.

As an implementation, the communication apparatus 1200 may further include a communication interface 1203.

The communication interface 1203 is used for communicating with other communication devices through a transmission medium, so that the communication device 1200 can communicate with other communication devices. In embodiments of the present application, the communication interface may be a transceiver, circuit, bus, module, or other type of communication interface. In the embodiment of the present application, when the communication interface is a transceiver, the transceiver may include an independent receiver and an independent transmitter; the communication interface may also be a transceiver integrating transceiving functions, or an interface circuit.

The apparatus 1200 may also include, as one implementation, a communication line 1204.

The communication interface 1203, the processor 1201 and the memory 1202 may be connected to each other via a communication line 1204; the communication line 1204 may be a Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) bus, an Extended Industry Standard Architecture (EISA) bus, or the like. The communication lines 1204 may be divided into an address bus, a data bus, a control bus, etc. For ease of illustration, only one thick line is shown in FIG. 12, but that does not indicate only one bus or one type of bus.

When the communication apparatus adopts the form shown in fig. 12, the processor 1201 in fig. 12 may invoke the computer stored in the memory 1202 to execute the instructions, so that the communication apparatus 1200 may execute the method executed by the terminal device or the SMF or UPF in any of the above-described method embodiments.

Specifically, the functions/implementation processes of the processing unit 1101 and the transceiving unit 1102 shown in fig. 11 can be implemented by the processor 1201 in fig. 12 calling the computer execution instructions stored in the memory 1202; alternatively, the function/implementation procedure of the processing unit 1101 shown in fig. 11 may be implemented by the processor 1201 in fig. 12 calling a computer executing instruction stored in the memory 1202, and the function/implementation procedure of the transceiving unit 1102 shown in fig. 11 may be implemented by the communication interface 1203 in fig. 12.

In implementation, the steps of the above method may be performed by integrated logic circuits of hardware in a processor or by instructions in the form of software. The steps of the method disclosed in connection with the embodiments of the present application may be embodied as hardware processor, or may be implemented as a combination of hardware and software modules in a 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 a memory, and a processor reads information in the memory and completes the steps of the method in combination with hardware of the processor. To avoid repetition, it is not described in detail here.

It should be noted that the processor in the embodiments of the present application may be an integrated circuit chip having signal processing capability. In implementation, the steps of the above method embodiments may be performed by integrated logic circuits of hardware in a processor or instructions in the form of software. The processor may be a general purpose processor, a Digital Signal Processing (DSP), an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device, discrete gate or transistor logic device, or discrete hardware components.

It will be appreciated that the memory in the embodiments of the subject application can be either volatile memory or nonvolatile memory, or can include both volatile and nonvolatile memory. The non-volatile memory may be a read-only memory (ROM), a Programmable ROM (PROM), an Erasable PROM (EPROM), an electrically Erasable EPROM (EEPROM), or a flash memory. It should be noted that the memory of the systems and methods described herein is intended to comprise, without being limited to, these and any other suitable types of memory.

Based on the same inventive concept as the method embodiment, an embodiment of the present application further provides a communication system, where the communication system may include a terminal device, an SMF, and a PCF, and is configured to execute the method executed by the terminal device, the SMF, and the PCF of any of the above embodiments, and related features may refer to the above method embodiment, and are not described herein again.

In a possible design, the communication system may further include some or all of the access network device, the AMF, the AF, the NEF, and the UPF, and is configured to perform the methods performed by the access network device, the AMF, the AF, the NEF, and the UPF in any of the above embodiments, respectively.

It should be noted that, other network elements or devices in any one or any of the multi-core networks described in the above embodiments of the present application may also be included in the communication system and used to implement corresponding functions, and details are not described herein.

In the embodiments of the present application, unless otherwise specified or conflicting with respect to logic, the terms and/or descriptions in different embodiments have consistency and may be mutually cited, and technical features in different embodiments may be combined to form a new embodiment according to their inherent logic relationship.

As will be appreciated by one skilled in the art, embodiments of the present application may be provided as a method, system, or computer program product. Accordingly, the present application may take the form of an entirely hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment or an embodiment combining software and hardware aspects. Furthermore, the present application may take the form of a computer program product embodied on one or more computer-usable storage media (including, but not limited to, disk storage, optical storage, and the like) having computer-usable program code embodied therein.

The present application is described with reference to flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of methods, apparatus (systems), and computer program products according to the application. It will be understood that each flow and/or block of the flow diagrams and/or block diagrams, and combinations of flows and/or blocks in the flow diagrams and/or block diagrams, can be implemented by computer program instructions. These computer program instructions may be provided to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, embedded processor, or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a machine, such that the instructions, which execute via the processor of the computer or other programmable data processing apparatus, create means for implementing the functions specified in the flowchart flow or flows and/or block diagram block or blocks.

These computer program instructions may also be stored in a computer-readable memory that can direct a computer or other programmable data processing apparatus to function in a particular manner, such that the instructions stored in the computer-readable memory produce an article of manufacture including instruction means which implement the function specified in the flowchart flow or flows and/or block diagram block or blocks.

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 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 intended to include such modifications and variations as well.

Claims

1. A method for packet transmission, comprising:

a session management network element (SMF) receives a UE session establishment request initiated by User Equipment (UE), and determines that the established UE session signs a redundant transmission according to a redundant transmission parameter in subscription information of the UE; wherein the UE comprises a first UE and a second UE; the UE session comprises a first UE session and a second UE session; the signed redundant transmission is used for indicating that the first UE session and the second UE session are mutually redundant transmission;

sending a response message for completing the establishment of the UE session to the terminal side equipment; wherein, the response message includes the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the first UE comprise the redundant transmission indication, a UE identity, a pair UE identity, the redundancy mode, a slice identity, and data network name information; wherein the UE identity is used for indicating a unique identifier of the first UE; the pair UE identity is used for indicating a unique identifier of the second UE; the slice identifier is used for indicating a network slice accessed when the first UE performs redundancy transmission; the data network name is used for indicating a data network accessed when the first UE carries out redundancy transmission.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the first UE are the same as the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the second UE.

4. A method according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the redundancy means comprises a first means and a second means; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the redundancy information comprises a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy flag; wherein, different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identification are the redundant messages.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein said issuing configuration parameters to the UPF further comprises:

indicating a first UE session or a second UE session to be configured as a first redundancy processing session, wherein the first redundancy processing session is used for carrying out duplication removal on uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session, carrying out redundancy duplication on messages which arrive at the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink mode, and sending redundancy messages obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or

7. A method for transmitting a message, comprising:

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the redundant manner includes a first manner and a second manner; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the redundancy information comprises a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy flag; wherein, different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identification are the redundant messages.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein, when the redundancy mode is the first mode, the de-duplicating the uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session comprises:

de-duplicating the uplink GTP-U message with the same redundant identifier;

11. The method of claim 9, wherein, when the redundancy mode is the second mode, the de-duplicating the uplink redundancy messages of the first UE session and the second UE session comprises:

12. A method for transmitting a message, comprising:

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the redundant manner includes a first manner and a second manner; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the redundant information comprises a redundant transmission indication and a redundant identification; wherein, different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identifications are the redundant messages.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein, when the redundancy mode is the first mode, the de-duplicating the downlink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode comprises:

16. The method of claim 14, wherein, when the redundancy mode is the second mode, the de-duplicating the downlink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode comprises:

17. A session management network element, comprising:

18. The session management network element of claim 17, wherein the redundant transmission parameters corresponding to the first UE include the redundant transmission indication, a UE identity, a pair UE identity, the redundancy mode, a slice identity, and data network name information; wherein the UE identity is used for indicating a unique identifier of the first UE; the pair UE identity is used for indicating a unique identifier of the second UE; the slice identifier is used for indicating a network slice accessed when the first UE performs redundancy transmission; the data network name is used for indicating a data network accessed when the first UE carries out redundancy transmission.

19. The session management network element of claim 18, wherein the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the first UE are the same as the slice identifier and the data network name included in the redundant transmission parameter corresponding to the second UE.

20. A session management network element according to any of claims 17 to 19, wherein the redundant mode comprises a first mode and a second mode; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the packet is a redundant packet is set in the second extension field of the Ethernet packet.

21. The session management network element of claim 20, wherein the redundancy information comprises a redundancy transmission indication and a redundancy identity; wherein, different messages correspond to different redundant identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundant identifications are the redundant messages.

22. The element of claim 21, wherein the processing unit is further configured to indicate that a first UE session or a second UE session is configured as a first redundant processing session, where the first redundant processing session deduplicates uplink redundant packets of the first UE session and the second UE session, redundantly replicates packets that reach the first UE session or the second UE session in a downlink direction, and sends redundant packets obtained by redundancy duplication to the first UE and the second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; or

23. A user plane network element, comprising:

a processing unit, configured to perform duplicate removal on uplink redundancy packets of the first UE session and the second UE session according to the redundancy transmission indication and the redundancy mode in the configuration parameter; the first UE session and the second UE session are in redundant transmission with each other; the redundant transmission indication is used for indicating whether redundant transmission exists; the redundancy mode is a mode of indicating that the message is a redundancy message;

24. The user plane network element of claim 23, wherein the redundant means comprises a first means and a second means; in the first mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a first extension field of a message header of the SDAP message; in the second mode, the redundant information indicating that the message is a redundant message is arranged in a second extended field of the Ethernet message; the redundant information comprises a redundant transmission indication and a redundant identification; different messages correspond to different redundancy identifications, and the messages carrying the same redundancy identification are the redundancy messages.

25. The user plane network element of claim 24, wherein the processing unit is specifically configured to, when the redundancy mode is the first mode, configure the processing unit to

sending the downlink GTP-U message to an NG-RAN; the redundant information indicates the NG-RAN to package the redundant information in the downlink GTP-U message to a downlink SDAP message and is sent to corresponding first UE and second UE through the first UE session and the second UE session; the redundant information is carried in a first extension field of a message header of the downlink SDAP message.

26. The user plane network element of claim 24, wherein when the redundancy mode is a second mode, the processing unit is specifically configured to:

receiving an uplink Ethernet message sent by the first UE or the second UE, and acquiring redundant information from a second extended field of the uplink Ethernet message; carrying out duplicate removal on uplink Ethernet messages with the same redundancy identification;

27. A terminal-side device, comprising:

28. A communications apparatus, comprising:

at least one processor; and a memory communicatively coupled to the at least one processor, a communication interface;

the communication interface is used for receiving signals from other communication devices except the communication device and transmitting the signals to the processor or sending the signals from the processor to other communication devices except the communication device;

the memory stores instructions executable by the at least one processor, the at least one processor causing the communications apparatus to implement the method of any one of claims 1 to 6, or to implement the method of any one of claims 7 to 11, or to implement the method of any one of claims 12 to 16 by executing the instructions stored by the memory.

29. A computer-readable storage medium, having a computer-readable program stored thereon, which, when run on a communication apparatus, causes the communication apparatus to perform the method of any one of claims 1 to 6, or to implement the method of any one of claims 7 to 11, or to implement the method of any one of claims 12 to 16.