CN117062179A

CN117062179A - Communication method, communication device, access network equipment and terminal equipment of network slice

Info

Publication number: CN117062179A
Application number: CN202210488329.1A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 孙海洋; 朱方园; 许胜锋
Original assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2022-05-06
Filing date: 2022-05-06
Publication date: 2023-11-14
Also published as: WO2023213132A1

Abstract

A communication method, a communication device, an access network device and a terminal device for network slicing. The method comprises the following steps: the method comprises the steps that a strategy control function network element obtains information of a network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the strategy control function network element further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating available time of the network slice, the first position indication information is used for indicating available position areas of the network slice, and the strategy control function network element generates user routing strategy information according to the information of the network slice; and sending the user routing strategy information to the terminal equipment through the access and mobile management function network element.

Description

Communication method, communication device, access network equipment and terminal equipment of network slice

Technical Field

The present application relates to the field of communications, and more particularly, to a network slice communication method, a communication apparatus, an access network device, and a terminal device.

Background

Network slicing (Network slicing) is to virtualize a plurality of end-to-end networks on the basis of one general hardware through slicing technology, and each Network has different Network functions and adapts to different types of service requirements. The network slicing technology can enable an operator to divide a plurality of virtual networks in one hardware infrastructure, allocate resources according to needs and flexibly combine the capabilities, thereby meeting different requirements of various services. Existing network slices are deployed at Tracking Area (TA) granularity, and are slow to update, and as diversified services appear, more flexible deployment of network slices is required, e.g., network slices are allowed to be used for a certain period of time, e.g., network slices are allowed to be used in a certain location Area, and the service Area of a network slice may be matched with an existing TA, but may also be different.

Therefore, how to communicate under a network slice when the network slice is deployed in a certain time period and a certain location area is a problem to be solved.

Disclosure of Invention

The application provides a communication method, a communication device, access network equipment and terminal equipment of a network slice, which can realize that different network element equipment communicates under the network slice when the network slice limiting the use time and/or the use position is deployed at a network side.

In a first aspect, a communication method (e.g., a method that may be performed with reference to the PCF in fig. 13) of a network slice is provided, including: the policy control function network element obtains the information of the network slice (refer to the description of step S210), wherein the information of the network slice includes the identification information of the network slice, the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, the first location indication information is used for indicating the available location area of the network slice, and the policy control function network element generates the user routing policy information according to the information of the network slice (refer to the description of step S220); the policy control function network element sends the user routing policy information to the terminal device via the access and mobility management function network element (refer to the description of step S230).

Therefore, in the present application, the policy control function network element obtains the information of the network slice and generates the user routing policy information according to the information of the network slice, where the information of the network slice includes the first time indication information and/or the first location indication information, and the policy control function network element sends the user routing policy information to the terminal device through the access and mobility management function network element, and when the terminal device receives the user routing policy information, the terminal device may join the network slice according to the definition of the user routing policy information (such as the first time indication information and/or the first location indication information). Therefore, the flexible deployment of the network slice is realized, and the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area is achieved.

With reference to the first aspect, in one possible implementation manner of the first aspect, the user routing policy information includes a first user routing policy rule, where the first user routing policy rule includes identification information of the network slice and identification information of an application program served by the network slice, and the first user routing policy rule further includes a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice, where the first time window is less than or equal to an available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the first location range is less than or equal to an available location area indicated by the first location indication information.

In the application, the first user routing policy rule associates the network slice with the application program of the network slice service through the identification information of the network slice and the identification information of the application program of the network slice service, and the terminal equipment selects to apply for accessing the network slice when the terminal equipment uses the application program according to the first user routing policy rule. Meanwhile, the first time window is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information, the first position range is smaller than or equal to the available position area indicated by the first position indication information, network delay and blocking caused by instability of the network slice when the terminal equipment is near the ending time or the available position area of the edge of the network slice are avoided, and user experience degree can be improved.

Optionally, the first user routing policy comprises a first routing descriptor comprising the first time window and/or a first range of locations.

With reference to the first aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the first aspect, the acquiring, by the policy control function network element, information of a network slice includes:

The strategy control function network element receives the information of the network slice from the network slice management function network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

the policy control function network element receives information of the network slice from the access and mobility management function network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

the policy control function network element receives information for the network slice from a unified data store.

In addition, the policy control function network element may also perform other actions performed by the PCF in fig. 13, which are not described herein.

In a second aspect, there is provided a communication method (for example, a method that may be performed with reference to the AMF in fig. 14) of a network slice, including: the access and mobility management function network element obtains information of a network slice (refer to description of step S310 and step S510), where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice;

the access and mobility management function network element processes the information of the network slice (refer to the description of step S320).

In the application, the flexibility of processing the network slice information at the network side can be improved by acquiring and processing the network slice information through the network element with the access and mobile management functions.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the processing, by the access and mobility management function network element, information of the network slice includes: the access and mobility management function network element sends the information of the network slice to the policy control function network element.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the processing, by the access and mobility management function network element, information of the network slice includes: the access and mobility management function network element generates local data network information (refer to the description of step S320) according to the information of the network slice, where the local data network information includes a name of a local data network, and the local data network information further includes second time indication information and/or second location indication information, where the second time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the local data network, and the second location indication information is used to indicate an available cell of the local data network, where the available time indicated by the second time indication information is less than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the available cell indicated by the second location indication information is less than or equal to the available location area indicated by the first location indication information; the access and mobility management function network element sends the local data network information to the terminal device.

The local data network information is generated by the network element with the access and mobile management functions, and then the local data network information is sent to the terminal equipment, so that the terminal equipment can determine whether to apply for joining the local data network information according to the current time and/or the current position, and the influence on the existing communication flow is small.

Optionally, the second location indication information is used to indicate available cells and/or available tracking areas of the local data network.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the communication method further includes: the access and mobility management function network element sends the name of the local data network corresponding to the network slice to the policy control function network element (refer to the description of step S340).

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the communication method further includes: the access and mobility management function network element sends the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information to the policy control function network element (see description of step S340).

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the processing, by the access and mobility management function network element, information of the network slice includes: in case the access and mobility management function network element determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the access and mobility management function network element sends first timing information to the terminal device (refer to the description of step S530), where the first timing information is used to instruct the terminal device to release a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice or the local data network established by the terminal device before the time indicated by the first timing information expires, where the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

By sending the first timing information to the terminal device, where the first timing information is used to instruct the terminal device to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime, the service of the terminal device can not be cut off instantaneously, so as to promote the user experience.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the processing, by the access and mobility management function network element, information of the network slice includes: in the case that the access and mobility management function network element determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the access and mobility management function network element sends, to the terminal device, a cause value (refer to description of step S550) for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice, where when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, it is that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice, the cause value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice is used to indicate that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

By sending the cause value to the terminal equipment, the terminal equipment releases the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice when receiving the cause value, so that the service of the terminal equipment can not be cut off instantaneously, thereby improving the feeling of users.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the processing, by the access and mobility management function network element, information of the network slice includes: the access and mobility management function network element determines second timing information (refer to the description of step S580) when the access and mobility management function network element determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or that the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice; upon time-out of the second timing information, the access and mobility management function network element sends a request to the session management function network element to release a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice or the local data network established by the terminal device.

In particular, when the time of the second timing information expires and the access and mobility management function network element does not receive a request sent by the terminal device to release a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice or the local data network established by the terminal device, the access and mobility management function network element sends a request to the session management function network element to release a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice or the local data network established by the terminal device.

When the time of the second timing information is over, the session management function network element releases the request of the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice, so that resource waste is avoided when the terminal equipment does not successfully release the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice, and meanwhile, the second timing information can enable the service of the terminal equipment not to be cut off instantaneously, thereby improving the experience of users.

Optionally, the first timing information is less than or equal to the second timing information.

With reference to the second aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the second aspect, the acquiring, by the access and mobility management function network element, information of a network slice includes: the access and mobility management function network element receives information of the network slice from the network slice management function network element; or, the access and mobility management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or, the access and mobility management function network element receives information of the network slice from the network slice selection function network element.

In addition, the AMF may perform other actions performed by the AMF in fig. 14 or fig. 16, which are not described herein.

In a third aspect, a communication method (e.g., a method that may be performed with reference to the SMF of fig. 15) of a network slice is provided, including: the session management function network element obtains information of a network slice (refer to the description of step S410), where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used to indicate an available position area of the network slice; in case the session management function network element determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the session management function network element determines release of the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device (refer to the description of step S420), wherein the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

Under the condition that the session management function network element determines that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, the session management function network element determines the release of the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice, so that the network slice is flexibly deployed, and the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area is achieved.

With reference to the third aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the third aspect, the communication method further includes: the session management function network element sends first timing information (refer to the description of step S430) to the terminal device, where the first timing information is used to instruct the terminal device to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice, which is established by the terminal device, before the time indicated by the first timing information expires.

With reference to the third aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the third aspect, the communication method further includes: in case the session management function network element determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the session management function network element sends a cause value to the terminal device for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice (refer to the description of step S450)

When the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

With reference to the third aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the third aspect, the communication method further includes: the session management function network element determines second timing information (refer to the description of step S480) when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, wherein the fact that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal device exceeds the available position area of the network slice; and when the time of the second timing information is over, the session management function network element releases the request of the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice.

With reference to the third aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the third aspect, the acquiring, by the session management function network element, information of a network slice includes: the session management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the network slice management function network element; or, the session management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

the session management function network element receives information of the network slice from the network slice selection function network element.

In addition, the session management function network element SMF may also perform other actions performed by the SMF in fig. 15, which are not described herein.

In a fourth aspect, there is provided a method of communication of a network slice, for example (the method performed by the RAN of fig. 17 being referred to), comprising: the access network device receives the information of the network slice sent by the access and mobility management function network element (refer to the description of step S620), where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice; in the case that the access network device determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the access network device determines to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice (refer to the description of step S650), where the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice refers to that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

Under the condition that the access network equipment determines that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, the access network equipment determines the release of the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice, so that the network slice is flexibly deployed, and the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area is achieved.

With reference to the fourth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fourth aspect, the determining, by the access network device, to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice, which is set up by the terminal device, includes: the access network device instructs the terminal device to initiate release of the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first timing information expires via a broadcast message or a unicast message (see description of step S660).

With reference to the fourth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fourth aspect, the determining, by the access network device, to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice, which is set up by the terminal device, includes: the access network equipment sends a reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice to the terminal equipment, wherein when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice, the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice; or, when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice, the reason value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice is used to indicate that the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice (refer to the description of step S670).

With reference to the fourth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fourth aspect, the determining by the access network device to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device further includes: the access network device informs the access and mobility management function that the network slice is not available in a tracking area, which is a cell covered by the access network device, when the time of the second timing information expires (refer to the description of step S680).

Specifically, when the time of the second timing information is over and the access network device does not receive the request of releasing the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice or the local data network, which is sent by the terminal device, the access network device notifies the access and mobility management function network element that the network slice is not available in the tracking area, and then the access and mobility management function network element initiates the release of the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice, which is established by the terminal device. The resource waste when the terminal equipment does not successfully release the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice is avoided, and meanwhile, the service of the terminal equipment can not be cut off instantaneously by the second timing information, so that the feeling of a user is improved.

In addition, the access network device RAN may also perform other actions performed by the RAN in fig. 17, which are not described herein.

In a fifth aspect, there is provided a communication method of network slicing (a method that may be performed by a terminal device in fig. 15, 16 or 17), including: the terminal device receives first timing information sent by the network device, where the first timing information is used to instruct the terminal device to release a protocol data unit session (refer to the description of step S460, step S540 or step S670) that is set up by the terminal device and associated with the network slice in a time indicated by the first timing information; the terminal device releases the protocol data unit session before the time indicated by the timing information expires (refer to the description of step S470, step S570 or step S670).

The terminal equipment receives the timing information sent by the network equipment, and releases the protocol data unit session before the time indicated by the timing information is overtime, so that the flexible deployment of the network slice is realized, and the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area is achieved.

With reference to the fifth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, when the network device is an access network device, the terminal device receives the first timing information through a broadcast message or a unicast message (refer to the description of step S660).

With reference to the fifth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, when the network device is a core network device, the terminal device receives the first timing information through a configuration update message of the terminal device (refer to the description of step S440 or step S540).

With reference to the fifth aspect, in one possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, the terminal device receives a cause value sent by a network device and used for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice (refer to the description of step S670), where when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that is, the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice, the cause value rejected by the terminal device to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, if the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, the reason value of refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

With reference to the fifth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, when the network device is an access network device, the terminal device receives the cause value through a broadcast message or a unicast message.

With reference to the fifth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, when the network device is a core network device, the terminal device receives the cause value through a configuration update message of the terminal device.

With reference to the fifth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, the communication method further includes: the terminal device deletes the identification information of the network slice from the locally stored allowed network slice selection auxiliary information list.

With reference to the fifth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the fifth aspect, the communication method further includes: the terminal equipment receives configuration information sent by network side equipment, wherein the configuration information comprises identification information of the rejected network slice; the terminal device deletes the identification information of the network slice from the locally stored allowed network slice selection auxiliary information list.

In addition, the terminal device may also perform other actions performed by the terminal device in fig. 15, 16 or 17, which are not described herein.

In a sixth aspect, there is provided a communication method of network slicing (a method that may be performed by a terminal device in fig. 14), including: the terminal device receives the local data network information (refer to the description of step S330) sent by the access and mobility management function network element, where the local data network information includes a name of a local data network, the local data network information further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information, the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the local data network, the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the local data network, and the available location area indicated by the first location indication information is a cell granularity; the terminal device determines whether the terminal device can access the local data network according to the local data network information (refer to the description of step S330).

With reference to the sixth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the sixth aspect, the determining, by the terminal device, whether the terminal device can use the local data network according to the local data network information includes: when the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time indicated by the first time indication information, the terminal equipment is not accessed to the local data network; or,

When the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area indicated by the first position indication information, the terminal equipment is not accessed to the local data network.

In addition, the terminal device may also perform other actions performed by the terminal device in fig. 14, which are not described herein.

In a seventh aspect, a communications apparatus is provided that includes a processor, a transceiver, and a memory for storing instructions, the processor for executing the instructions stored by the memory to control the transceiver to receive or transmit signals; the transceiver is configured to obtain information of a network slice, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice, and the processor is configured to generate user routing policy information according to the information of the network slice; the transceiver is further configured to send the user routing policy information to the terminal device via the access and mobility management function network element.

With reference to the seventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the seventh aspect, the user routing policy information includes a first user routing policy rule, where the first user routing policy rule includes identification information of the network slice, identification information of an application program served by the network slice, and the first user routing policy rule further includes a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice, where the first time window is less than or equal to an available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the first location range is less than or equal to an available location area indicated by the first location indication information.

With reference to the seventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the seventh aspect, the transceiver is specifically configured to: receiving information of the network slice from a network slice management function network element; or, receiving information of the network slice from the access and mobility management function network element; or, information from the unified data store for the network slice is received.

An eighth aspect provides a communication apparatus comprising: a processor, a transceiver, and a memory for storing instructions, the processor for executing the instructions stored by the memory to control the transceiver to receive or transmit signals; the transceiver is used for acquiring information of a network slice, the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, the information of the network slice also comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice; the processor is configured to process information of the network slice.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the transceiver unit is specifically configured to: and sending the information of the network slice to a strategy control function network element.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the processor is specifically configured to: generating local data network information according to the information of the network slice, wherein the local data network information comprises the name of a local data network, the local data network information further comprises second time indication information and/or second position indication information, the second time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the local data network, the second position indication information is used for indicating the available cell of the local data network, the available time indicated by the second time indication information is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the available cell indicated by the second position indication information is smaller than or equal to the available position area indicated by the first position indication information; the transceiver is also configured to transmit the local data network information to a terminal device.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the transceiver is further configured to: and sending the name of the local data network corresponding to the network slice to a strategy control function network element.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the transceiver is further configured to: and sending the second time indication information and/or the second position indication information to a strategy control function network element.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the processor is specifically configured to: determining from the information of the network slice that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the transceiver being specifically configured to: and under the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, sending first timing information to the terminal equipment, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the terminal equipment to release a protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice or the local data network before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime, and the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the processor is specifically configured to: determining from the information of the network slice that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the transceiver being specifically configured to: under the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, sending a reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice to the terminal equipment, wherein when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice, the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the processor is specifically configured to: in case it is determined from the information of the network slice that the terminal device does not meet the requirements for accessing the network slice, a second timing information is determined,

wherein, the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, namely, the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal device exceeds the available position area of the network slice; the transceiver unit is further configured to: and when the time of the second timing information is over, sending a request for releasing the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice or the local data network to a session management function network element.

With reference to the eighth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eighth aspect, the transceiver is specifically configured to: receiving information of the network slice from a network slice management function network element; or, receiving information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or, information of the network slice from the network slice selection function network element is received.

In a ninth aspect, there is provided a communication apparatus comprising: a processor, a transceiver, and a memory for storing instructions, the processor for executing the instructions stored by the memory to control the transceiver to receive or transmit signals; the transceiver is used for acquiring information of a network slice, the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, the information of the network slice also comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice; the processor is configured to determine, when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, release of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device, where the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

With reference to the ninth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the ninth aspect, the transceiver is further configured to: and sending first timing information to the terminal equipment, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the terminal equipment to release the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime.

With reference to the ninth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the ninth aspect, the processor is further configured to: determining that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice; the transceiver is further configured to send, to the terminal device, a cause value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice if the session management function network element determines, according to the network slice information, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, where when the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice is that a current time of the terminal device exceeds an available time of the network slice, the cause value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice is used to indicate that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

With reference to the ninth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the ninth aspect, the processor is further configured to: determining second timing information under the condition that the information of the network slice determines that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, wherein the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice; and when the time of the second timing information is over, the session management function network element releases the request of the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice.

With reference to the ninth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the ninth aspect, the transceiver is specifically configured to: receiving information of the network slice from a network slice management function network element; or, receiving information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or, information of the network slice from the network slice selection function network element is received.

In a tenth aspect, an access network device is provided, comprising: a processor, a transceiver, and a memory for storing instructions, the processor for executing the instructions stored by the memory to control the transceiver to receive or transmit signals: the transceiver is configured to receive information of a network slice sent by an access and mobility management function network element, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used to indicate an available position area of the network slice; the processor is configured to determine to release a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device when the access network device determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, where the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

With reference to the tenth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the tenth aspect, the transceiver is further configured to: the terminal device is instructed to initiate release of the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice by a broadcast message before the time indicated by the first timing information expires.

With reference to the tenth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the tenth aspect, the transceiver is further configured to: and notifying the access and mobility management function network element that the network slice is not available in a tracking area when the time of the second timing information is over, wherein the tracking area is a cell covered by the access network equipment.

An eleventh aspect provides a terminal device, including: a processor, a transceiver, and a memory for storing instructions, the processor for executing the instructions stored by the memory to control the transceiver to receive or transmit signals; the transceiver is used for receiving timing information sent by the network equipment, the timing information is used for indicating the terminal equipment to release a protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with a network slice within the time indicated by the timing information, and the identification information of the network slice is the identification information of the network slice; the processor is configured to release the protocol data unit session before a time indicated by the timing information expires.

With reference to the eleventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eleventh aspect, when the network device is an access network device, the transceiver receives the timing information through a broadcast message.

With reference to the eleventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eleventh aspect, when the network device is a core network device, the transceiver receives the timing information through a configuration update message of the terminal device.

With reference to the eleventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eleventh aspect, the transceiver receives a cause value sent by a network device for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice, where when the terminal device does not meet a requirement for accessing the network slice, it is that a current time of the terminal device exceeds an available time of the network slice, the cause value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice is used to indicate that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, if the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, the reason value of refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

With reference to the eleventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eleventh aspect, when the network device is an access network device, the transceiver receives the cause value through a unicast message.

With reference to the eleventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eleventh aspect, when the network device is a core network device, the transceiver receives the cause value through a configuration update message of the terminal device.

With reference to the eleventh aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the eleventh aspect, the processor is further configured to: the identification information of the network slice is deleted from the locally stored list of allowed network slice selection assistance information.

In a twelfth aspect, there is provided a terminal device including: a processor, a transceiver, and a memory for storing instructions, the processor for executing the instructions stored by the memory to control the transceiver to receive or transmit signals; the transceiver is configured to receive local data network information sent by an access and mobility management function network element, where the local data network information includes a name of a local data network, and the local data network information further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the local data network, the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the local data network, and the available location area indicated by the first location indication information is a cell granularity; the processor is configured to determine whether the terminal device can access the local data network according to the local data network information.

With reference to the twelfth aspect, in a possible implementation manner of the twelfth aspect, the processor is specifically configured to: when the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time indicated by the first time indication information, the terminal equipment is not accessed to the local data network; or when the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area indicated by the first position indication information, the terminal equipment does not access the local data network.

A thirteenth aspect provides a computer program product comprising instructions which, when run on a computer, cause the computer to perform the method of the first aspect or any possible implementation of the first aspect, or to perform the method of the second aspect or any possible implementation of the third aspect, or to perform the method of the fourth aspect or any possible implementation of the fourth aspect, or to perform the method of the fifth aspect or any possible implementation of the fifth aspect, or to perform the method of the sixth aspect or any possible implementation of the sixth aspect.

A fourteenth aspect provides a computer readable storage medium having stored therein a computer program for performing the method of the first aspect or any of the possible implementations of the first aspect, or the method of the second aspect or any of the possible implementations of the third aspect, or the method of the fourth aspect or any of the possible implementations of the fourth aspect, or the method of the fifth aspect or any of the possible implementations of the fifth aspect, or the method of any of the possible implementations of the sixth aspect, when executed.

In a fifteenth aspect, a chip system is provided, the chip system comprising a processor for a communication device to implement the functions involved in the above aspects, e.g. to generate, receive, transmit, or process data and/or information involved in the above methods. In one possible design, the system-on-chip further includes a memory for holding program instructions and data necessary for the communication device. The chip system can be composed of chips, and can also comprise chips and other discrete devices.

A sixteenth aspect provides a communication system comprising means having functions of implementing the methods and the various possible designs of the first aspect, means having functions of implementing the methods and the various possible designs of the fourth aspect, or means having functions of implementing the methods and the various possible designs of the fifth aspect, and means having functions of implementing the methods and the various possible designs of the sixth aspect; alternatively, the communication system includes a device having functions of realizing the methods and the various possible designs of the second aspect, a device having functions of realizing the methods and the various possible designs of the fourth aspect, and a device having functions of realizing the methods and the various possible designs of the sixth aspect; alternatively, the communication system includes a device having functions for realizing the methods and the various possible designs of the third aspect, a device having functions for realizing the methods and the various possible designs of the fourth aspect, and a device having functions for realizing the methods and the various possible designs of the sixth aspect.

Drawings

FIG. 1 shows a schematic scene diagram of a 5G supported eMBB scene provided by the present application;

Fig. 2 shows a schematic diagram of a 5G network slice architecture provided by the present application;

FIG. 3 is a schematic block diagram of a type of network slice corresponding to three exemplary scenarios supported by 5G provided by the present application;

fig. 4 is a schematic flow chart of a method for UE slice selection in a registration procedure provided by the present application;

FIG. 5 shows a schematic block diagram of NSSP provided by the present application;

FIG. 6 is a flow chart illustrating routing of data packets to a PDU session in accordance with the present application;

FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of a network architecture to which the present application is applied;

FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application applies;

FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application applies;

FIG. 10 is a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application applies;

FIG. 11 is a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application applies;

FIG. 12 is a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application applies;

FIG. 13 shows a schematic flow chart of a communication method that is a network slice of the present application;

FIG. 14 shows a schematic flow chart of a communication method that is a network slice of the present application;

FIG. 15 shows a schematic flow chart of a communication method that is a network slice of the present application;

FIG. 16 shows a schematic flow chart of a communication method that is a network slice of the present application;

FIG. 17 shows a schematic flow chart of a communication method that is a network slice of the present application;

fig. 18 shows a schematic block diagram of a communication device of the present application;

fig. 19 shows a schematic block diagram of a communication device of the present application;

fig. 20 shows a schematic structural diagram of a terminal device of the present application;

fig. 21 shows a schematic structural diagram of an access network device according to the present application.

Detailed Description

The technical scheme of the application will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

The technical scheme of the application can be applied to various communication systems, such as: global system for mobile communications (global system for mobile communications, GSM), code division multiple access (code division multiple access, CDMA), wideband code division multiple access (wideband code division multiple access, WCDMA) systems, general packet radio service (general packet radio service, GPRS), long term evolution (long term evolution, LTE) systems, LTE frequency division duplex (frequency division duplex, FDD) systems, LTE time division duplex (time division duplex, TDD), universal mobile telecommunications system (universal mobile telecommunication system, UMTS), worldwide interoperability for microwave access (worldwide interoperability for microwave access, wiMAX) communication systems, fifth generation (5th generation,5G) systems or New Radio (NR), and may be adapted for use with subsequent evolution systems such as sixth generation 6G communication systems, even higher seventh generation 7G communication systems, and the like.

The terminal device in the present application may also be referred to as: a User Equipment (UE), a Mobile Station (MS), a Mobile Terminal (MT), an access terminal, a subscriber unit, a subscriber station, a mobile station, a remote terminal, a mobile device, a user terminal, a wireless communication device, a user agent, or a user equipment, etc.

The terminal device may be a wireless terminal, which may be a device that provides voice and/or other traffic data connectivity to a user, a handheld device with wireless connectivity, or other processing device connected to a wireless modem. The wireless terminals may communicate with one or more core networks via a radio access network (Radio Access Network, RAN), which may be mobile terminals such as mobile phones (or "cellular" phones) and computers with mobile terminals, e.g., portable, pocket, hand-held, computer-built-in or vehicle-mounted mobile devices that exchange voice and/or data with the radio access network. Such as personal communication services (Personal Communication Service, PCS) phones, cordless phones, session initiation protocol (Session Initiation Protocol, SIP) phones, wireless local loop (Wireless Local Loop, WLL) stations, personal digital assistants (Personal Digital Assistant, PDAs), and the like. The wireless Terminal may also be referred to as a system, subscriber Unit (Subscriber Unit), subscriber Station (Subscriber Station), mobile Station (Mobile Station), remote Station (Remote Station), remote Terminal (Remote Terminal), access Terminal (Access Terminal), user Terminal (User Terminal), user Agent (User Agent), user device (User Device or User Equipment), mobile internet device (Mobile internet device, MID), wearable device, virtual Reality (VR) device, augmented reality (augmented reality, AR) device, wireless Terminal in industrial control (industrial control), wireless Terminal in unmanned aerial vehicle (self driving), wireless Terminal in teleoperation (Remote medical surgery), wireless Terminal in smart grid (smart grid), wireless Terminal in transportation security (transportation safety), wireless Terminal in smart city (smart city), wireless Terminal in smart home (smart home), wireless Terminal in Mobile home (smart home), wireless Terminal in the future, mobile home (PLMN) device, future Mobile communication device, etc., and the present application defines a network of the future, communication device, etc.

By way of example and not limitation, in the present disclosure, a wearable device may also be referred to as a wearable smart device, which is a generic term for the intelligent design of daily wear by applying wearable technology, and the development of wearable devices, such as glasses, gloves, watches, apparel, shoes, and the like. The wearable device is a portable device that is worn directly on the body or integrated into the clothing or accessories of the user. The wearable device is not only a hardware device, but also can realize a powerful function through software support, data interaction and cloud interaction. The generalized wearable intelligent device includes full functionality, large size, and may not rely on the smart phone to implement complete or partial functionality, such as: smart watches or smart glasses, etc., and focus on only certain types of application functions, and need to be used in combination with other devices, such as smart phones, for example, various smart bracelets, smart jewelry, etc. for physical sign monitoring.

In addition, in the application, the terminal equipment can also be terminal equipment in an internet of things (internet of things, ioT) system, and the IoT is an important component of the development of future information technology, and the main technical characteristics of the terminal equipment are that the object is connected with the network through a communication technology, so that the man-machine interconnection and the intelligent network of the internet of things are realized.

While the various terminal devices described above, if located on a vehicle (e.g., placed in a vehicle or mounted in a vehicle), may be considered as in-vehicle terminal devices, for example, also referred to as in-vehicle units (OBUs).

In the present application, the terminal device may further include a relay (relay). Or it is understood that all that is capable of data communication with a base station can be seen as a terminal device.

An access network device in the present application may be a device for communicating with a terminal device, may be a base station, or an access point, or a network device, or may refer to a device in an access network that communicates over the air-interface, through one or more sectors, with wireless terminals. The network device may be configured to inter-convert the received air frames with IP packets as a router between the wireless terminal and the rest of the access network, which may include an Internet Protocol (IP) network. The network device may also coordinate attribute management for the air interface. For example, the access network device may be a base station (Base Transceiver Station, BTS) in global mobile communications (Global System of Mobile communication, GSM) or code division multiple access (Code Division Multiple Access, CDMA), a base station (NodeB, NB) in wideband code division multiple access (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access, WCDMA), an evolved NodeB (eNB or eNodeB) in an LTE system, a radio controller in a cloud radio access network (cloud radio access network, CRAN) scenario, or an access device in a relay station, an access point, a vehicle-mounted device, a wearable device, and an access device in a 5G network or a network device in a PLMN network of future evolution, or the like, an Access Point (AP) in a WLAN, or a gNB in a new radio system (NR) the present application is not limited.

In addition, in the present application, the access network device is a device in an access network (radio access network, RAN), or a RAN node that accesses the terminal device to the wireless network. For example, by way of illustration and not limitation, as access network devices, there may be cited: a gNB, a transmission and reception point (transmission reception point, TRP), an evolved Node B (eNB), a radio network controller (radio network controller, RNC), a Node B (Node B, NB), a base station controller (base station controller, BSC), a base transceiver station (base transceiver station, BTS), a home base station (e.g., home evolved NodeB, or home Node B, HNB), a baseband unit (BBU), or a wireless fidelity (wireless fidelity, wifi) Access Point (AP), etc.

The access network device provides service for a cell, and the terminal device communicates with the access network device through transmission resources (e.g., frequency domain resources, or spectrum resources) used by the cell, where the cell may be a cell corresponding to the access network device (e.g., a base station), and the cell may belong to a macro base station or a base station corresponding to a small cell (small cell), where the small cell may include: urban cells (metro cells), micro cells (micro cells), pico cells (pico cells), femto cells (femto cells) and the like, and the small cells have the characteristics of small coverage area and low transmitting power and are suitable for providing high-rate data transmission services.

In order that the present application may be clearly understood, a description will first be made of a part of the prior art to which the present application relates.

First, the concept of network slicing is introduced. The 5G will open an era of everything interconnection, with 5G supporting three major scenarios of enhanced mobile broadband (Enhanced Mobile Broadband, eMBB), large-scale machine communication (Massive MachineType Communication, mctc), and high reliability low latency connection (Ultra-Reliable Low latency Communications, uirllc). The three scenes contain applications of diversified differentiation.

The eMBB is based on breakthroughs in wireless-side spectrum utilization and spectrum bandwidth techniques, 5G may provide transmission rates that are more than 10 times faster than 4G. For augmented Reality (Augmented Reality, AR)/Virtual Reality (VR), high definition video live broadcast, only 5G ultra-high rate can meet the requirements, and the transmission rate of 4G is not supportable. When VR is used for high definition or large interactive games, a network cable is required to be dragged to acquire data, wireless connection is performed through a 5G network in the future, and VR/AR can acquire a fast experience, as shown in fig. 1, fig. 1 is a schematic scene diagram of an eMBB scene supported by 5G.

MIoT can support 100 thousands of devices accessed per square kilometer through techniques such as multi-user shared access, ultra-dense heterogeneous network and the like, and the 5G can be 10 times as large as 4G. Recently, the rapid development of smart cities, and public facilities such as street lamps, well covers, water meters and the like have network connection capability, so that remote management can be performed, but 5G has more innovation. Based on the strong connection capability of the 5G network, public equipment in various industries in the city can be accessed to the intelligent management platform. The public facilities work cooperatively through the 5G network, and can be managed uniformly by a small amount of maintenance personnel, so that the operation efficiency of the city is greatly improved.

The most typical application of uRRLC in 5G scene is automatic driving, and the most common scene of automatic driving such as sudden braking, car-to-car, car-to-person, car-to-infrastructure and the like are carried out simultaneously, so that a great deal of data processing and decision making are needed instantaneously. There is therefore a need for networks with large bandwidth, low latency and high reliability, 5G networks with the ability to cope with such scenarios.

The 4G era is to meet all application scenes and client groups through one network, for example, the network can provide NB-IoT capability to open NB related characteristics on network elements, and to build network reliability, redundant backup of network element equipment level is increased, and the requirements of mass market are continuously met through continuous superposition of characteristics.

However, the requirements of various services in the vertical industry in terms of time delay, connection number, reliability, safety and the like are far away and have unpredictability, for example, AR service needs to use network ultra-high bandwidth of >1600Mbps, energy meter reading service needs network to provide mass connection, automatic driving needs network to ensure end-to-end low time delay of several milliseconds and high reliability of more than 99.999 percent, and if all the requirements at present and the requirements possibly proposed in the future are still to be met through one network, the realization is not possible at all.

Network slicing (Network slicing) is to virtualize a plurality of end-to-end networks on the basis of one general hardware through slicing technology, and each Network has different Network functions and adapts to different types of service requirements. Fig. 2 is a schematic diagram of a 5G network slicing architecture provided in the present application, after an operator purchases physical resources, an eMBB slicing network is virtually created by using the physical resources for mass internet surfing services, and then an emtc slicing network is virtually created by using the physical resources for intelligent meter reading requirements of some manufacturers in the vertical industry, wherein the two slicing networks respectively provide services for different service scenarios. The network slicing technology can enable an operator to divide a plurality of virtual networks in one hardware infrastructure, allocate resources according to needs and flexibly combine the capabilities, thereby meeting different requirements of various services. When new demands are put forward and the current network cannot meet the demands, an operator only needs to virtually draw out a new slicing network for the demands, and the existing slicing network is not influenced, so that the service is on line at the fastest speed.

It should be appreciated that mctc may also be referred to as large-scale internet of things (Massive Internet of Things, MIoT).

The types of network slices corresponding to the three typical scenes supported by 5G are an eMBB slice, an mMTC slice and a uRLLC slice respectively. Fig. 3 is a schematic block diagram of a type of network slice corresponding to three typical scenarios supported by 5G provided by the present application. The eMBB service is used for surfing the internet, cloud games, high-definition videos and voices, the transmission rate is required to reach 10Gbps, and the type of the network slice corresponding to the eMBB service is eMBB slice; mMTC services such as intelligent home, intelligent meter reading, safe city and the like require connection density of millions of square kilometers, and have low power consumption, and the type of the corresponding network slice is mMTC slice; uRLLC traffic such as autopilot, telemedicine and other high reliability traffic requires millisecond delays, the type of corresponding network slice being a uRLLC slice.

Three major characteristics of network slicing are isolation, on-demand customization, and end-to-end. The on-demand customization comprises on-demand slice life cycle provision, on-demand distributed deployment, on-demand capacity provision and on-demand network service provision. Isolation includes resource isolation, security isolation, OAM isolation, and different isolation techniques may be used for different domains. The end-to-end network slice comprises an end-to-end network, including an access network, a transmission network and a core network, and a cross-domain slice management system is needed.

Some of the terms in network slicing are presented below.

Identification information (Single Network Slice Selection Assistance Information, S-NSSAI) for a network slice is used to identify a network slice. Depending on the operator' S operational or deployment needs, one S-nsai may be associated with one or more network slice instances, and one network slice instance may be associated with one or more S-nsais. S-NSSAI includes two parts, slice service type (Slice/ServiceType, SST) and Slice difference (Slice Differentiator, SD):

SST refers to the expected network slice behavior in terms of characteristics and services. For example, SST has standard values ranging from 1, 2, and 3, with values of 1 representing emmbb, 2 representing URLLC, and 3 representing mctc.

SD is an optional information used to supplement SST to distinguish multiple network slices of the same slice/traffic type.

The SST and SD parts taken together represent the slice type and a plurality of slices of the same slice type, as shown in table 1. For example, S-NSSAI values of 0x01000000, 0x02000000, and 0x03000000 represent an eMBB type slice, a uRLLC type slice, and a MIoT type slice, respectively. And S-NSSAI values of 0x01000001 and 0x01000002 represent eMBB type slices serving user group 1 and user group 2, respectively.

TABLE 1S-NSSAI Structure

The network slice selection assistance information (Network Slice Selection Assistance Information, NSSAI) is a set of S-NSSNIs.

The NSSAI used in the 5G network has a desired (Requested) NSSAI, an Allowed (Allowed) NSSAI, a Configured (Configured) NSSAI, a Subscribed (subscore) S-NSSAI (S), and their specific definitions are shown in Table 2.

TABLE 2NSSAI definition

After understanding the network slice related concepts, the following describes how the UE applies to join a network slice. Fig. 4 is a schematic flow chart of a method 100 for UE slice selection in a registration procedure provided by the present application.

S110, the UE sends a registration request message to the RAN when registering with a public land mobile network (Public Land Mobile Network, PLMN) through an access type. If the Configured NSSAI of the PLMN or the Allowed NSSAI of the access type of the PLMN is stored on the UE, the UE will carry the Requested NSSAI information in a Non-access stratum (NAS) registration request message and an Access Stratum (AS) message, the Requested NSSAI containing the S-NSSAI of the slice to which the UE requests access.

S120, the RAN selects an original Initial AMF according to a globally unique AMF identification (Globally Unique AMF Identifier, GUAMI) or a Requested nsai, and sends a registration request message to the Initial AMF. If the UE does not provide the Requested nsai and the GUAMI in the access stratum message, the RAN should send a registration request message from the UE to a default AMF (default AMF).

S130, an Initial AMF inquires unified data management (Unified Data Management, UDM) to acquire UE subscription information including subscore S-NSSAIs. The Initial AMF determines whether the UE can be served according to the received Requested NSSAI, subscribed S-NSSAI, and local configuration. If the AMF can serve the UE, the Initial AMF remains the serving AMF for the UE, and the AMF then constructs an Allowed NSSAI based on the subscore S-NSSAI and the Requested NSSAI, which is returned to the UE via a registration accept message. If the Initial AMF fails to service the UE or a determination cannot be made, the AMF queries a network slice selection function (Network Slice Selection Function, NSSF). The AMF configures S-NSSAI supported by each associated TA. This information is reported by the RAN when a connection is established with the AMF.

S140, AMF sends information such as Requested NSSAI, subscore S-NSSAI, PLMN of permanent identity of user (Subscription Permanent Identifier, SUPI), tracking area identification code (Tracking Area identity, TAI) and the like to NSSF for inquiry.

S150, NSSF selects, according to the received information and the local configuration, an AMF Set or candidate AMF list that can serve the UE, an Allowed NSSAI applicable to the access type, possibly a Network slice instance that serves the UE, and a Network storage Function (NF Repository Function, NRF) in the instance for selecting a Network Function (NF), and sends these information to the Initial AMF.

S160, if the Initial AMF is not in the AMF Set and the AMF address information is not stored locally, the Initial AMF obtains a candidate AMF list by querying the NRF. The NRF returns a set of available AMF lists including AMF pointers and address information. The initiating AMF selects one of them as the target AMF.

S170a, if the Initial AMF cannot obtain the candidate AMF list by querying the NRF, the Initial AMF needs to send a registration request message of the UE to the RAN, and the message sent by the Initial AMF to the RAN contains an AMF Set and an Allowed NSSAI.

S170b, the RAN determines a target AMF according to the AMF Set, the Allowed NSSAI and the local configuration, and sends a registration request message of the UE to the target AMF, wherein the message comprises the AMF Set and the Allowed NSSAI.

S180, if the Initial AMF decides to directly send the NAS message to the target AMF based on the local policy and subscription information, the Initial AMF sends the UE registration request message and other information obtained from the NSSF except for the AMF set to the target AMF.

If the initial AMF decides to forward the NAS message to the target AMF via the RAN based on the local policy and subscription information, the initial AMF sends a REroute NAS message to the RAN. The Reroute NAS message includes target AMF Set information and a registration request message, and related information obtained from the NSSF.

It should be appreciated that if the Initial AMF cannot obtain the candidate AMF list by querying the NRF, S170a and S170b will be performed without performing S180.

S190a, after receiving the registration request message sent in S180 or S170b, the target AMF continues to perform the relevant steps of the registration procedure. The target AMF sends a registration acceptance message to the RAN, wherein the message carries information such as Allowed NSSAI, NSSP and the like.

And S190b, the RAN sends a registration acceptance message to the UE, wherein the message carries information such as Allowed NSSAI, NSSP and the like.

When the UE joins the network slice, the UE needs to select a suitable protocol data unit (protocol data unit, PDU) session for the uplink traffic flow, the PDU associating a user terminal UE with the data network DN, the PDU session providing a PDU connection service. The PDU session established between the terminal device and the network device has properties of network slicing, DNN, and session service continuity (session service continuity, SSC) mode, etc. The third generation partnership project (3rd generation partnership project,3GPP) defines a user urs to determine the correspondence of Applications (APP) to slice, DNN and SSC modes. The association relation between the identification information of the application service and the network slice is determined by a network slice selection policy (Network Slice Selection Policy, NSSP), and FIG. 5 is a schematic structure diagram of NSSP provided by the application, and UE associates APP id and S-NSSAI through NSSP. NSSP is part of the rules of the urs (UE Route Selection Policy, UE routing policy) issued by the PCF to the terminal device via the AMF.

The urs include one or more urs rules, one of which mainly includes two parts, a traffic descriptor (Traffic Descriptor) and a routing descriptor (Route Selection Descriptor). Wherein Traffic descriptor includes names or identifiers of a plurality of APPs, and the like, route Selection Descriptor includes network slice selection information corresponding to each APP, and general network slice selection information, that is, network slice selection information that may be used by APPs not included in Traffic descriptor, and the like. The form of the urs information may be shown in table 3, the content of the urs information may be shown in table 4, and Route Selection Descriptor may be shown in table 5.

Table 3 formal list of urs p information

Table 4 content list of urs p information

Table 5 routing descriptor list

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The UE may trigger establishment or modification of the PDU session after receiving the urs rules. For example, when there is no PDU session meeting the requirements, the UE initiates a PDU session establishment procedure; when there is a satisfactory session, it is possible to directly use the already existing PDU session, and the UE routes the data packet onto the satisfactory PDU session (there are multiple UEs that will choose one according to configuration, etc.). Whenever a UE detects a new application, the UE evaluates whether the application matches the traffic descriptor Traffic descriptor in the Rule in order of Rule priority (Rule priority).

When a match is possible, the UE selects the routing descriptors (Route Selection Descriptor, RSD) in the rule in order of routing descriptor priority (Route Selection Descriptor Precedence). When the RSD is not valid, or is no longer valid, a jump is made to the next RSD, otherwise the RSD is selected.

The routing descriptor of the urs rule should be considered valid only if all of the following conditions are met:

the allowed NSSAI if present (S) is included in the non-roaming case or in the roaming case in the mapping of allowed NSSAI to HPLMN S-NSSAI (S).

The DNN, if present, is a local data network (Local Area Data Network, LADN) DNN and the UE is in the availability area of this LADN.

If a time window exists, and the time matches the time indicated in the time window.

If a location criterion exists, and the UE location matches the content indicated in the location criterion.

The time window and location criteria in the RSD are determined by the corresponding traffic, as background traffic specifies the specific traffic time and place. Background traffic such as update traffic of software on a terminal device.

Fig. 6 is a flow chart of routing data packets to PDU sessions provided by the present application, where a UE selects an appropriate PDU session for an upstream traffic flow according to the urs. The UE routes the data packets of different uplink traffic to different PDU sessions according to the urs. For example, packet a may be routed to a session of DNN1, S-nsai-a, SSC 1; packet B may be routed to DNN1, S-NSSAI-a, SSC2 session, or DNN1, S-NSSAI-a, SSC1 session; packet C may be routed onto a session of DNN2, S-NSSAI-a, SSC 3; data packet D may be routed to DNN1, S-NSSAI-b, SSC1 session; packet E may be routed to a session of DNN2, S-nsai-a, SSC 3; packet F may be routed to a session of DNN2, S-NSSAI-c, SSC 3.

The above network slices are deployed at TA granularity. That is, the RAN reports the TA and the corresponding S-nsai when reporting the supported S-nsai to the AMF. The network side may consider the TA to be homogeneous, i.e. any area within a TA supports the same network slice. Network slices are deployed for services on a service area, and the service area of a network slice may match an existing TA as network slice deployments increase, but may also be different. For example, the service area of a network slice is not the entire TA, but a portion of the area in the TA. Further, within the service area of a network slice, the network slice may not always be capable of providing service, and may only be capable of providing service for a specified time. When a network slice that can be serviced only within a certain time interval is deployed, the UE and network configuration may be affected. For example, configured NSSAI may change when this network slice becomes available, which may affect the Allowed NSSAI and other parameters. Furthermore, the UE and network configuration may also be affected by this after the network slice is out of service, i.e. the network slice is no longer available.

In the following, an application scenario of the present application is described, and fig. 7 shows a schematic diagram of a network architecture to which the present application is applied, where the network architecture is a service architecture of a 5G network, for example. As shown in fig. 11, the Network architecture mainly includes a terminal device (UE), AN Access Network (AN) device, AN Access and mobility management function (Access and Mobility Management Function, AMF), a session management function (Session Management Function, SMF), a User plane function (User Plane Function, UPF), a policy control function (Policy Control function, PCF), a unified Data management (Unified Data Management, UDM), a unified Data repository function (Unified Data Repository, UDR), a Data Network (DN), a Network slice selection function (Network Slice Selection Function, NSSF), and a Network slice management function Network element (Network Slice Management Function, NSMF).

In this network architecture, the AMF provides mobility management functions in the core network, mainly responsible for access and mobility control, such as user location update, user registration network, user handover, etc., including registration management (registration management, RM) and connection management (connection management, CM), access authentication and access authorization, reachability management and mobility management, etc.

SMF is a session management function in the core network, mainly responsible for session management in the mobile network, such as session establishment, modification, release. The specific functions such as allocating an IP address to a user, selecting an AMF such as a UPF providing a message forwarding function, and the like are responsible for forwarding a session management related message between the UE and the SMF in addition to mobility management of the UE.

The UPF is a user plane function in the core network, mainly provides user plane support, and is responsible for forwarding and receiving user data in the terminal equipment. User data can be received from the data network and transmitted to the terminal equipment through the access network equipment; the UPF network element may also receive user data from the terminal device via the access network device and forward the user data to the data network. The transmission resources and scheduling functions in the UPF network element that serve the terminal device are managed and controlled by the SMF network element.

PCF is a policy management function in core network, mainly supporting to provide unified policy framework to control network behavior, providing policy rules to control layer network function, and meanwhile, taking charge of obtaining user subscription information related to policy decision. Is responsible for formulating policies related to mobility management, session management, charging, etc. for the UE.

The UDM is a subscription database in the core network, stores subscription data of a user in the 5G network, and is responsible for functions related to authentication and authorization of the user, and specifically includes: authentication credential processing, user identity processing, subscription information management, access authorization, and the like.

The UDR is a unified data warehousing function in the core network, for the UDM to store or retrieve subscription data of the user equipment, and for the PCF to store policy data or read policy data.

The DN provides a Service network for a user to data transmission services, such as IMS (IP multimedia Service), internet, etc. The UE accesses the data network through a PDU session established between the UE and the DN.

NSMF is a newly introduced network element used for operators to deploy network slices, and can inform other network elements of the information of deploying network slices.

In the network architecture, UE (user equipment) is connected with (R) AN equipment through a Uu interface to interact Access layer information and wireless data transmission, and the UE is connected with AN AMF (Non-Access Stratum) through AN N1 interface to interact NAS information; the AN equipment is connected with the AMF through AN N2 interface, and the AN equipment is connected with the UPF through AN N3 interface; the UPFs are connected with DN through N9 interfaces, and are connected with SMF through N4 interfaces; the SMF is connected with the PCF through an N7 interface, the SMF is connected with the UDM through an N10 interface, the SMF controls the UPF through an N4 interface, and meanwhile, the SMF is connected with the AMF through an N11 interface; the AMFs are connected with each other through an N14 interface, the AMFs are connected with the UDM through an N8 interface, and the AMFs are connected with the PCF through an N15 interface; the UDM is connected with the UDR through an N35 interface, and the PCF is connected with the UDR through an N36 interface; NSMF is connected with PCF through N90 interface; NSMF is connected with UDM through N91 interface; NSMF is connected with NSSF through an N92 interface; NSMF is connected with AMF through N93 interface; NSMF is connected to SMF through an N94 interface.

It should be understood that the names of interfaces between network elements in the present application are merely exemplary, and interfaces between network elements may be other names, and the names of interfaces are not limited in the present application.

It should be understood that fig. 7 is only an exemplary architecture diagram, and the network architecture may include other functional units or functional network elements in addition to the functional units shown in fig. 7, which the present application is not limited to.

It should also be appreciated that the functional units of the core network may operate independently, or may be combined together to implement certain control functions, such as: the AMF, SMF and PCF may be combined together to serve as a management device, for completing access control and mobility management functions such as access authentication, security encryption, location registration, etc. of the terminal device, session management functions such as recording, releasing, and changing a user plane transmission path, and functions of analyzing some slice related data (e.g. congestion) and terminal device related data, and the UPF serving as a gateway device mainly completes functions such as routing forwarding of user plane data, for example: is responsible for filtering data messages of terminal equipment, transmitting/forwarding data, controlling rate, generating charging information and the like.

It should be understood that more network nodes may be further included in the application scenario shown in fig. 7, for example, other AMFs, and the access network device or the terminal device included in the application scenario shown in fig. 7 may be any of the access network devices or the terminal devices in the various forms described above. The application is not shown one by one in the figures.

Fig. 8 shows a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application is applied. The network architecture is, for example, a 5G network server architecture. As shown in fig. 8, the control plane functions of AMF, SMF, UPF, PCF, UDR, UDM, NSSF and NSMF interact with each other using a server interface.

The AMF provides a servitization interface Namf, the SMF provides a servitization interface Nsf, the PCF provides a servitization interface Npcf, the UDM provides a servitization interface Nudm, the NSSF provides a service interface Nnssf to the outside, the UDR provides a service interface Nudr to the outside, and the UDM provides a service interface Nudm to the outside, and the NSMF provides a service interface Nnsmf to the outside.

It should be understood that the specific functions of the network elements of the network architecture shown in fig. 8 may refer to the description of the network architecture shown in fig. 7, and the remaining interfaces may refer to the description of fig. 7. In order to avoid repetition, a description thereof is omitted.

The network architecture shown in fig. 7 and fig. 8 is a system architecture of a non-roaming scenario, and a schematic diagram of the network architecture in the roaming scenario is described below.

Fig. 9 shows a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application is applied. The network architecture is, for example, a 5G network server architecture. And, the network architecture is a roaming network architecture, for example, a roaming scenario of Local Breakout (LBO). The 5G network includes a home public land mobile network (home public land mobile network, HPLMN) and a visited public land mobile network (visited public land mobile network, VPLMN). The HPLMN is the home network of the UE and the VPLMN is the roaming network of the UE. In this scenario, traffic needs to be offloaded in the VPLMN, that is, traffic of the UE needs to be routed into the DN of the VPLMN. Wherein the VPLMN and the HPLMN communicate with a home security edge protection agent (home security edge protection proxy, hSEPP) through a visited security edge protection agent (visited security edge protection proxy, vSEPP).

As shown in fig. 9, in VPLMN, UE accesses to a 5G network through (R) AN, and UE communicates with AMF through AN N1 interface (abbreviated as N1); (R) the AN network element communicates with the AMF through AN N2 interface (N2 for short); (R) the AN network element communicates with the UPF through AN N3 interface (N3 for short); the SMF communicates with the UPF through an N4 interface (abbreviated as N4), and the UPF accesses the DN through an N6 interface (abbreviated as N6).

In addition, the control plane functions such as NSSF, AMF, SMF, PCF of the VPLMN shown in fig. 9 interact with each other using a service interface. The control plane functions of UDM, PCF, NSSF, etc. of the HPLMN shown in fig. 9 also use the servitization interface for interaction.

Fig. 10 shows a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application is applied, and the network architecture is a roaming network architecture, such as a roaming scenario of LBO. The 5G network includes an HPLMN and a VPLMN. In this network architecture NSSF, UE, (R) AN, SMF within the VPLMN, and UDM, NSMF within the HPLMN can all communicate with AMF within the VPLMN. The SMF within the VPLMN is also able to communicate with the UPF, PCF (also called vcpcf) within the VPLMN and UDM within the HPLMN. The PCF within the VPLMN is also capable of communicating with the PCF (also referred to as the hPCF) within the HPLMN. The UPF within the VPLMN is also able to communicate with the (R) AN and DN within the VPLMN. In fig. 14, "Nxx" between two network elements indicates an interface between the two network elements.

Fig. 11 shows a schematic diagram of another network architecture to which the present application is applied, for example, a service architecture of a 5G network. The network architecture is a roaming network architecture, such as a roaming scenario of Home Routing (HR). The 5G network includes an HPLMN and a VPLMN, the HPLMN being a home network of the UE, the VPLMN being a roaming network of the UE, the VPLMN and the HPLMN communicating through vSEPP and hSEPP. Unlike the network architecture shown in fig. 9, in the scenario shown in fig. 11, traffic needs to be offloaded at the HPLMN, i.e., the traffic of the UE needs to be routed into the DN of the HPLMN.

As shown in fig. 11, the UPF in the VPLMN communicates with the UPF in the HPLMN through an N9 interface (abbreviated as N9). The control plane functions such as NSSF, AMF, SMF of the VPLMN and PCF shown in fig. 11 are interacted with using a service interface. The control plane functions of UDM, PCF, NSSF, etc. of the HPLMN shown in fig. 11 also use the servitization interface for interaction.

Fig. 12 is a schematic diagram of yet another network architecture to which the present application is applied, and the network architecture is a roaming network architecture, for example, a roaming scenario of HR. The 5G network includes an HPLMN and a VPLMN. In this network architecture, NSSF, UE, (R) AN, SMF, PCF within the VPLMN, and AUSF, UDM within the HPLMN can all communicate with AMF within the VPLMN. The SMF within the VPLMN is also able to communicate with the UPF within the VPLMN and the SMF within the HPLMN. The PCF in the VPLMN is also capable of communicating with the PCF in the HPLMN. The UPF within the VPLMN is also capable of communicating with the (R) AN within the VPLMN and with the UPF within the HPLMN. NSSF within the VPLMN can also communicate with NSSF within the HPLMN. The SMF within the HPLMN is also capable of communicating with the UPF, UDM, and PCF within the HPLMN. The UPF in the HPLMN can also access DNs in the VPLMN. In fig. 12, "Nxx" between two network elements indicates an interface between the two network elements.

The following describes in detail a communication method of a network slice according to the present application with reference to fig. 13, fig. 13 is a schematic flowchart of a communication method 200 of a network slice according to the present application, and the method 200 may be applied to the application scenario described above, but may also be applied to other communication scenarios, which is not limited herein.

As shown in fig. 13, the method 200 shown in fig. 13 may include S210 to S250. The various steps in method 200 are described in detail below in conjunction with fig. 13.

S210, the PCF acquires information of a network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice.

For example, the identification information of the network slice may be identification information of the network slice (Single Network Slice Selection Assistance Information, S-NSSAI).

Optionally, the first time indication information includes a set of start time and end time, or a plurality of sets of start time and end time. If the first time indication information includes a start time of 2022, 3, 6, and an end time of 2022, 3, 7, and if the first time indication information includes a first group of start time of 2022, 3, 6, and end time of 2022, 3, 7, and a second group of start time of 2022, 4, 6, and end time of 2022, 4, 7.

Alternatively, the first time indication information may include a start time and an end time unit that are days, hours, and the like. The first time indication information includes a start time of 2022, 3, 6, and 00:00:00, end time 2022, 3, 7, 23:59:59.

optionally, the first time indication information may include a start time or an end time that is an absolute time, or may be an offset relative to a certain time, for example, an initial time may be set to 1970, 1 month, 1 day, and 00:00:00, the offset of the start time is 8 hours (or 28, 800 seconds), i.e. the start time is 1970, 1 month, 1 day 08:00:00, the offset of the end time is 10 hours (or 36,000 seconds), i.e. the end time is 10 in 1970, 1 month, 1 day: 00:00.

optionally, the first location indication information may include one or more of the following: cell identity (list), global RAN node identity list, tracking cell identity (list). The cell identity (list) may be, for example, in particular a cell identity or list of evolved universal terrestrial Radio access network (Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network, E-UTRAN) E-UTRAN or New Radio (NR). This may indicate that the network slice is available for service only within the service area of the corresponding cell, RAN node, or tracking area. When the information of the network slice only comprises the first location indication information, the tracking area identifier (list) contained in the first location indication information can be added with the cell identifier (list), so that the available location area of the network slice indicated by the first location indication information can be of a cell granularity, and the granularity of the available location area of the network slice is smaller than that of the available location area of the network slice in the prior art.

That is, if the information of the network slice includes first time indication information, the PCF may know which network slice may be serviced only for a specific time through the information of the network slice, and the available time of the network slice may be embodied by the first time indication information.

If the information of the network slice includes first location indication information, the PCF may know, through the information of the network slice, which network slice is only serviceable within a particular location range, and the available location range of the network slice may be embodied by the first location indication information.

Alternatively, the PCF obtaining information for the network slice may include the following.

In a first possible implementation, NSMF configures the information of the network slice on the PCF.

In a second possible implementation, the NSMF sends the information of the network slice to the PCF. Correspondingly, the PCF receives the network slice information sent by the NSMF.

Optionally, the NSMF may be a network management (Operation Administration and Maintenance, OAM) or a newly introduced functional network element, which may be used for operator deployment of network slices.

In a third possible implementation, the NSMF may send the information of the network slice to the UDR, and further introduce the information of the network slice into the UDR, and the PCF accesses the UDR to obtain the information of the network slice.

In a fourth possible implementation, the NSMF sends the network slice information to the PCF via UDM/NSSF and AMF.

For example, the NSMF sends the information of the network slice to the UDM/NSSF. Accordingly, the UDM/NSSF receives and transmits the network slice information to the AMF. The AMF receives and transmits the information of the network slice to the PCF.

In a fifth possible implementation, the NSMF may also send the information of the network slice directly to the AMF. The corresponding AMF receives and transmits the information of the network slice to the PCF.

For example, when the NSSF network element is not configured in the network, the NSMF directly sends the information of the network slice to the AMF. The information of the network slice is forwarded by the AMF to the PCF.

In a sixth possible implementation, the information of the network slice is configured directly locally at the AMF through the OAM, and the AMF sends the configured information of the network slice to the PCF.

For example, when the NSSF element is not configured in the network, the operator configures the information of the network slice directly at the AMF through the OAM, and the AMF sends the configured information of the network slice to the PCF.

Alternatively, the AMF sending the information of the network slice to the PCF may include the following two ways.

In a first possible implementation, when the AMF receives the information of the network slice, the information of the network slice may be actively sent to the PCF.

In a second possible implementation, the PCF may subscribe to the AMF, and when the AMF acquires information of a network slice or the information of the network slice changes (e.g., when the available time indicated by the first time indication information and/or the available location area indicated by the first location indication information of the network slice changes), the AMF sends the information of the network slice to the PCF.

It should be appreciated that the AMF may or may not support the network slice. When the UE sends a message to the AMF requesting access to the network slice, the AMF does not support the network slice and thus cannot provide services to the UE, the AMF may query the NSSF, which selects an AMF Set or candidate AMF list that may serve the UE, as referred to herein as method 100.

In a seventh possible implementation, the PCF may obtain the information of the network slice directly from the NSSF.

For example, the PCF may request the NSSF to obtain information for a network slice, the NSSF receives the request, and sends the information for the network slice to the PCF; alternatively, the AMF may send the identification information of the PCF to the NSSF, which sends the PCF the information of the network slice according to the identification information of the PCF.

The above S210 describes various forms of information for the PCF to obtain the network slice. In S210, if the fourth possible implementation manner is adopted, after the UDM obtains the information of the network slice, the subscore S-NSSAI of the terminal device may be updated.

For example, when the UDM obtains the information of the network slice, the UDM may add the identification information of the network slice to the subsampled S-nsai Subscribed by the UE, which indicates that the UE may use the network slice. As regards the time of availability and/or the location available defined by the network slice, it may be controlled by other network elements, such as PCFs. Or the UDM may further add the first time indication information and/or the first location indication information of the network slice to the UE subsampled S saii, so as to limit that the UE can only use the network slice at the available time indicated by the first time indication information and/or the available location indicated by the first location indication information. The subscore S-NSSAI of the UE in the UDM is updated, the network side updates the Configured NSSAI stored by the UE according to the subscore S-NSSAI of the UE, the information of the network slice is added in the Configured NSSAI stored by the UE, and the UE can determine whether the network slice can be used by the UE at the current time and/or the current position according to the information of the network slice in the Configured NSSAI.

For another example, if the fourth, fifth or sixth possible implementation manner is adopted, after the AMF obtains the information of the network slice, the Configured nsai of the terminal device may be updated. For example, the AMF may add the information of the network slice to the Configured nsai stored by the UE, and the UE may determine whether the UE may use the network slice at the current time and/or the current location according to the information of the network slice in the Configured nsai.

S220, the PCF generates urs information from the information of the network slice.

For example, the urs information includes a first user routing policy rule that includes identification information of the network slice and identification information of an application of the network slice service, and the first urs rule further includes a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice. The PCF sets a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice according to the received information of the network slice. For example, when the information of the network slice includes first time indication information, the PCF may set the first time window to be less than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information. When the information of the network slice includes first location indication information, the PCF may set the first location range to be less than or equal to the available location area indicated by the first location indication information. That is, the setting of the first time window in the urs rule takes into account the availability time of the network slice and/or the setting of the first location range in the urs rule takes into account the availability location area of the network slice, in contrast to the solutions in the prior art.

For example, the first urs rule comprises a first routing descriptor RSD comprising the first time window and/or the first location range.

S230, the PCF sends the urs information to the AMF.

Accordingly, the AMF receives the urs p information.

S240, the AMF sends the urs information to the UE.

Correspondingly, the UE receives the urs information.

S250, the UE performs the urs information.

When the application program of the network slice service is triggered on the UE, the UE determines the network slice according to a first URSP rule in the URSP information. After determining the network slice, the UE may perform the following two operations.

In one possible implementation, the UE has already accessed the network slice at this time, for example, the UE may initiate a message to the network side to access the network slice and successfully access the network slice when the UE receives the updated configuration nsai. If the UE has now access to the network slice, the UE may select an appropriate PDU session based on the URSP information. If the PDU session conforming to the first URSP rule does not exist, the UE initiates a PDU session establishment procedure; when there is a session conforming to the first urs rule, the UE may directly use the existing PDU session.

In one possible implementation, the UE may initiate a message to the network side to access the network slice, where the UE has not yet accessed the network slice. When the UE applies for accessing the network slice, the AMF, the NSSF, or the UDM at the network side stores information of the network slice, and the NSSF, the AMF, or the UDM determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the first time indication information and/or the first location indication information of the network slice.

For example, when the AMF determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the first location indication information of the network slice, the AMF may subscribe (or acquire) the location information of the UE to the RAN according to the network slice, and the AMF may set a reporting area (Presence Reporting Area, PRA) according to the first location indication information of the network slice, and send the PRA to the RAN, and the RAN reports whether the UE is located in the PRA range. Of course, the AMF may subscribe to the location of the UE with the RAN in other ways as well. When the current location of the UE is located in the available location area of the network slice and/or the current time is within the available time of the network slice, the AMF determines that the UE can use the network slice currently, and proceeds with the access procedure. After the UE accesses the network slice, the UE may select an appropriate PDU session based on the urs information. When the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice, the AMF determines that the UE is currently unavailable to use the network slice.

When the AMF judges whether the UE can use the network slice according to the first time indication information of the network slice, if the current time exceeds the available time of the network slice, the AMF judges that the UE can not use the network slice currently.

After the AMF determines that the UE is currently unavailable to use the network slice, one or more of the following actions may be performed:

1) The AMF sets the network slice as the rejected reject network slice.

2) The AMF triggers the SMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice, which may be established by the UE when the available location area and/or the time of availability is met for the network slice.

In the method 200, the UE determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the obtained first time indication information and/or the first position indication information of the network slice, so as to achieve the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area. If the UE determines that there is an error, if the current time exceeds the available time indicated by the first time indication information and/or the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area indicated by the first location indication information, the UE determines that the network slice can be accessed, and at this time, the network side can perform verification again. Meanwhile, the UE determines a proper PDU session according to URSP information, the URSP information comprises a first time window and/or a first position range, the first time window is set to consider the available time of the network slice, the first position range is set to consider the available position area of the network slice, and the PDU session determined by the UE according to the URSP information meets the available time and/or the available position area of the network slice, so that the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area is achieved. Therefore, flexible deployment of network slices at the network side is realized.

In method 200, the PCF may also send a first session indication information to the UE, the first session indication information including a defined time of use for the network slice, the first session indication information being used to indicate that the UE releases a PDU session ((or re-evaluates validity of a urs p rule (or RSD)) when the defined time of use for the network slice expires, the PDU session being a session established by the UE associated with the network slice.

Alternatively, the limited use time may be less than or equal to the time indicated by the first time window in the urs p information, e.g. the time indicated by the first time window is ten to twelve points on a certain day, and the limited use time is five tenths of ten to eleven points on a certain day. The limited use time is smaller than the time indicated by the first time window in the URSP information, the UE can release the PDU session in advance, the influence caused by network instability in the later stage of the network slicing can be avoided, and the user experience degree can be improved.

In method 200, the PCF may further send second session indication information to the UE, where the second session indication information is used to indicate that the UE is to immediately release the PDU session when the UE detects that the route verification condition is not met, the PDU session being a session established by the UE associated with the network slice.

In a first implementation, the first session-indicating information and the second session-indicating information may be included in the urs p information, such as including the first session-indicating information and the second session-indicating information in an RSD in the urs p information.

In a second implementation, the PCF may send the first session indication information, the second session indication information, and the urs information to the UE via a message.

In a third implementation, the PCF may send the first session-indication information, the second session-indication information, and the urs information to the UE via different messages.

In the method 200, the NSSF or AMF may update its allowed network slice list according to the information of the network slice, for example, the NSSF or AMF adds the identifier of the network slice to the allowed network slice list in the time indicated by the first time indication information of the network slice at the current moment; the NSSF or AMF deletes the identification of the network slice from the list of allowed network slices if the current time is not within the time indicated by the first time indication information of the network slice.

In particular, when the operator deletes the network slice, if the network slice is in an allowed network slice of the UE through a terminal device configuration update (User equipment Configuration update, UCU) procedure, the AMF should set the network slice as a rejected network slice, and if the UE does not release the PDU session in time, the AMF triggers the PDU session release, and the procedure of triggering the PDU session release by the AMF may refer to steps in the method 500.

In addition, the AMF may also configure the available location area of the network slice (or NSSF sends the available location area of the network slice to the AMF) and subscribe to the location of the UE. When the UE is in connected mode, if the UE is not in the available location area of the network slice and the PDU session is not released in time, the AMF should trigger PDU session release if the operator wishes to have strict control. If the operator wishes to be able to wait for the UE to enter the connection management IDLE state (connection management-IDLE, CM-IDLE) state, released by the UE itself, no further action is required.

If the UE re-evaluates the association of the RSD in the urs that caused the application to change with the PDU session, the UE may perform such change based on implementation. For example, the UE releases the PDU session immediately or when the UE enters CM-IDLE state.

The following describes in detail a communication method of a network slice provided by the present application with reference to fig. 13, and fig. 13 is a schematic flowchart of a communication method 300 of a network slice of the present application. The method 300 may be applied to the application scenario described above, but may also be applied to other communication scenarios, and the application is not limited thereto.

As shown in fig. 14, the method 300 shown in fig. 14 may include S310 to S380. The various steps in method 300 are described in detail below in conjunction with FIG. 14.

S310, the AMF acquires information of a network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice.

The identification information, the first time indication information, and the first location indication information of the network slice may refer to the related description of fig. 12, which are not described herein.

Alternatively, the AMF acquiring the information of the network slice may include the following manner.

In a first possible implementation, the NSMF sends the information of the network slice to the AMF. Accordingly, the AMF receives the network slice information sent by the NSMF.

In a second possible implementation, the OAM configures the information of the network slice locally at the AMF.

In a third possible implementation, the NSMF sends the information of the network slice to the AMF through the UDM/NSSF.

For example, the NSMF sends the information of the network slice to the UDM/NSSF. Accordingly, the UDM/NSSF receives and transmits the network slice information to the AMF.

For another example, the NSMF configures the network slice information on the UDM/NSSF. The UDM/NSSF sends the information of the network slice to the AMF.

The above S310 describes various forms of information for the AMF to obtain the network slice. In S310, after the UDM obtains the information of the network slice, the subscore S-NSSAI of the terminal device may be updated. The specific process of updating the subscore S-nsai of the terminal device by the UDM may refer to the related description of fig. 12, which is not repeated here.

S320, the AMF generates local data network (Local Area Data Network, LADN) information according to the information of the network slice.

The AMF generates the LADN information according to information of the network slice (e.g., identification information of the network slice, the first time indication information, and/or the first location indication information).

For example, the AMF may convert the identification information of the network slice into a name DNN of the local data network.

For example, the AMF may locally store a correspondence table of a plurality of network slice identification information and a plurality of DNNs, and determine the DNN corresponding to the network slice identification information according to the network slice identification information and the correspondence table. For another example, if the correspondence table does not include identification information of the network slice, the AMF may assign DNN to the network slice based on an operator policy.

For another example, the AMF may determine the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information from the first time indication information and/or the first location indication information of the network slice while converting the identification information of the network slice into DNN. The second time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the local data network, and the available time indicated by the second time indication information is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information. The second location indication information is used for indicating available cells of the local data network, and the available cells indicated by the second location indication information are smaller than or equal to the available location areas indicated by the first location indication information.

Optionally, the LADN information comprises DNN.

Optionally, the LADN information includes DNN and second time indication information.

Optionally, the LADN information includes a name DNN of the local data network and second location indication information.

Optionally, the LADN information includes a name DNN of the local data network, second time indication information and second location indication information. The available location area may be a cell granularity area or a TA granularity area.

Optionally, the form of the second time indication information may refer to the form of the first time indication information, which is not described herein.

Optionally, the second time indication information may be a time length of the LADN service.

Alternatively, the second location indication information may include a cell identifier (list), that is, the LADN information may be a cell granularity, that is, the LADN service area corresponding to the LADN DNN may include cell granularity information.

Alternatively, the second location indication information may include a tracking area identity (list) and a cell identity (list).

Optionally, the network (such as OAM) may also configure the above-mentioned LADN information directly in the AMF (for example, may be configured according to the information of the network slice; of course, may also be configured according to other information, for example, OAM may be configured directly in the AMF to limit the usage time and/or the LADN information of the cell granularity, and may implement flexible information configuration in the AMF.

Alternatively, instead of generating the LADN information from the information of the network slice, the AMF may generate the LADN information from the information of the network slice and send the LADN to the AMF.

Optionally, when the AMF obtains the information of the network slice, after converting the identification information of the network slice into DNN, subscription information of the UE in the UDM may be updated (i.e. the DNN is added to the DNN subscribed by the UE), which indicates that the UE may use the DNN. Optionally, the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information of the DNN may be added to the subscription information of the UE, so as to limit that the UE can only use the DNN at the available time indicated by the second time indication information and/or the available location indicated by the second location indication information.

S330, the AMF sends the LADN information to the UE.

Optionally, the LADN information includes a name DNN of the local data network. When the LADN information includes only the name DNN of the local data network, the UE may determine whether the UE can access the DNN according to the configured urs p information or the urs re-issued by the PCF.

Optionally, the LADN information includes a name DNN of the local data network, and the LADN information further includes the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information. After receiving the LADN information, the UE may determine whether the UE may request to access the LADN according to the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information included in the LADN. Or when the UE receives the LADN information and the first application triggers, the UE may determine, according to the configured urs, that the network served by the first application is the DNN, and the UE may determine, according to the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information included in the LADN information, whether the UE may request to access the DNN.

When the current time of the UE exceeds the available time indicated by the second time indication information, the UE does not request to access the local data network; or when the current position of the UE exceeds the available position area indicated by the second position indication information, the UE does not request to access the local data network.

For example, when the UE is not in the LADN available location area, the UE:

a User Plane (UP) connection not requesting a PDU session that activates this LADN DNN;

no PDU session is established/modified for this LADN DNN (except for the data closure state change report for the established PDU session);

in addition, if the UE receives a PDU session release request from the network side, the UE may also release the existing PDU session of the LADN DNN.

It should be appreciated that the UE may have previously accessed the LADN DNN, but the current location of the UE is not in the area of the LADN available location.

For example, when the UE is not at the LADN availability time, the UE:

an UP connection not requesting the PDU session that activated the LADN DNN;

It should be appreciated that the UE may have previously accessed the LADN DNN, but the current time exceeds the time available for the LADN DNN.

For example, when the UE is in an LADN available location area and/or available time (when the LADN has both an available location area and an available time, the UE must satisfy the condition of being in the LADN available location area and available time at the same time), the UE:

PDU session establishment/modification of this LADN DNN may be requested;

an UP connection may be requested to activate an existing PDU session for this LADN DNN.

The LADN information sent by the AMF to the UE indicates the availability time of the LADN DNN, which is determined according to the availability time of the network slice, thereby achieving the effect that the network slice is used at a specific time.

The LADN information sent by the AMF to the UE also indicates an available location area of the LADN DNN, which is determined according to the available location area of the network slice, thereby achieving the effect of using the network slice in a specific location area.

And S340, the AMF sends the DNN of the local data network corresponding to the network slice to the PCF.

Optionally, the AMF may further send the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information to the PCF.

Optionally, the AMF may further send identification information of the network slice corresponding to the LADN DNN to the PCF.

S350, the PCF receives the DNN, and the PCF generates URSP information according to the DNN.

Optionally, the PCF generates the urs information based on the DNN, the second time indication information, and/or the second location indication information.

For example, the urs information includes a first urs rule including identification information of the DNN and an application of the DNN service; or the first URSP rule comprises the DNN and identification information of an application program of the DNN service, and further comprises a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the DNN, wherein the first time window is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the second time indication information, and the first location range is smaller than or equal to the available location area indicated by the second location indication information.

The first urs rule includes a first routing descriptor RSD, where the first RSD includes a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice.

Optionally, the PCF may determine the correspondence between the application and the DNN according to the correspondence between the application and the identification information of the network slice corresponding to the LADN DNN (i.e., determine the TD and the corresponding RSD).

S360, the PCF sends the urs information to the UE through the AMF.

S370, the UE performs the urs information.

Steps S350 to S370 are optional steps. Because the UE may have configured a urs, and the lag DNN is included in the urs, the PCF side may not send the urs information. Thus, the signaling overhead can be reduced, and the network resources can be saved.

Of course, if the PCF side issues the urs information and the urs information includes a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the DNN, because the first time window is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the second time indication information of the DNN, and the first location range is smaller than or equal to the available location area indicated by the second location indication information of the DNN, the UE may determine a suitable PDU session according to the urs information, so that delay and blocking of the network caused by instability (such as abrupt interruption) of the DNN network at the time when the DNN approaches the end or in an edge area of the available location of the DNN may be avoided, and user experience may be improved.

It should be understood that, in S330, when the UE receives the LADN information, the UE may initiate a message for accessing the DNN included in the LADN information to the network side; or when the UE triggers at the first application, the UE may determine that the network served by the first application is the DNN according to the configured urs, or the urs information received through S360, and the UE may initiate a message for accessing the DNN to the network side, where the first application is an application served by the DNN, and the urs information includes identification information of the first application. When the UE accesses the DNN, when the UE triggers at a first application, the UE determines a PDU session mapped by the first application according to the configured urs or the urs information received through S360.

And the UE determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the obtained LADN information, so that the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area is achieved. If the UE determines that there is an error, if the current time exceeds the available time indicated by the second time indication information and/or the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area indicated by the second location indication information, the UE determines that the DNN can be accessed, and at this time, the network side, such as AMF and SMF, can perform verification again. Meanwhile, when the UE determines a proper PDU session according to URSP information issued by the PCF, the URSP information comprises a first time window and/or a first position range, the first time window is set to consider the available time of DNN, the first position range is set to consider the available position area of DNN, and the PDU session determined by the UE according to the URSP information meets the available time and/or the available position area of DNN, so that the network slice is used at a specific time and a specific area. Therefore, flexible deployment of network slices at the network side is realized.

When the UE initiates a message for accessing the DNN to the network side, the network side verifies whether the UE is allowed to access the DNN. Thus, in the method 300, the AMF may also be included to subscribe the location of the UE with the RAN.

For example, the AMF sends the LADN information to the RAN, and the RAN reports the current actual location of the UE or whether the UE is in the location range indicated by the second location indication information according to the second location indication information included in the LADN information.

For example, the AMF subscribes to the location of the UE with the RAN according to the LADN information. The AMF may subscribe (or acquire) the location information of the UE to the RAN according to the LADN information, e.g., the AMF sets a reporting area (Presence Reporting Area, PRA) according to the location indication information of the LADN information, and sends the PRA to the RAN, where the RAN reports whether the UE is located in the PRA range, and the AMF determines whether the UE can use the DNN according to the current location of the UE.

The SMF at the network side also verifies whether the UE can access the DNN when the UE initiates a message to access the DNN.

For example, when the SMF receives a request sent by the UE to establish a PDU session with the LADN DNN, it may subscribe to the AMF for "UE mobility event notification" and/or "UE service time notification" so that the AMF reports to the SMF whether the UE is in an available location area and/or available time. The method specifically comprises the following cases:

In the first case, when the SMF is informed by the AMF that the UE in the LADN available location area and/or available time exists as OUT (i.e., the UE is not in the LADN available location area and/or available time), the SMF should:

immediately releasing a PDU session, wherein the PDU session is a session established by the UE, and the PDU session service network is the LADN DNN; or a data notification to close the user plane connection of the PDU session while maintaining the PDU session, the SMF may release the PDU session if the SMF is not informed that the UE has moved to the LADN available location area after a period of time.

IN the second case, when the SMF is informed by the AMF that the UE has the LADN available location area and/or the available time is IN (i.e., the UE is IN the LADN available location area and/or the available time), the SMF should: enabling data notification. When the SMF receives downlink data or data notification from the UPF, the network triggering the LADN PDU session triggers a service request procedure to activate the UP connection.

In a third case, when the SMF is informed that the presence of the UE in the LADN available location area and/or available time is unknown, the SMF may: enabling data notification, the SMF subscribes to the UPF for the event of a received downstream packet, and the UPF notifies the SMF when receiving the first downstream packet (of a certain quality of service flow), so that when the SMF receives downstream data or data notification from the UPF, the network triggering service request procedure of the LADN PDU session is triggered to activate the UP connection.

Optionally, the SMF may also obtain (from the AMF or the UDM) the available location area and/or the available time corresponding to the LADN DNN, for example, the AMF or the UDM sends the available location area and/or the available time corresponding to the LADN DNN to the SMF. The SMF determines whether the UE is in the LADN available location area and/or available time according to the available location area and/or available time corresponding to the LADN DNN and the location of the UE. Specifically:

when the SMF determines that the UE exists as OUT IN the LADN available location area and/or available time (i.e., the UE is not IN the LADN service area or service time window), or when the SMF determines that the UE exists IN the LADN available location area and/or available time is IN (i.e., the UE is IN the LADN service area or service time window), or when the SMF determines that the UE exists IN the LADN available location area and/or available time is unknown, the corresponding operation of the SMF may refer to the foregoing description and will not be repeated herein.

When the SMF receives a session management (Session Management, SM) request corresponding to the LADN sent by the AMF, the SMF determines whether the UE is in the available location area and/or available time of the LADN according to an indication (i.e. the available location area and/or available time of the UE) received from the AMF. In the case where the DNN is the lan DNN, if the SMF does not receive the indication sent by the AMF, the SMF considers that the UE is not in the available location area and/or available time of the lan. If the UE is not in the available location area and/or available time of the LADN, the SMF refuses the session management request corresponding to the LADN.

In method 300, the PCF may also send a first session indication information to the UE, the first session indication information including a defined time of use for the network slice, the first session indication information being used to indicate that the UE releases a PDU session ((or re-evaluates validity of a urs p rule (or RSD)) when the defined time of use for the network slice expires, the PDU session being a session established by the UE associated with the network slice.

In method 300, the PCF may also send second session indication information to the UE, where the second session indication information is used to indicate that the UE is to immediately release the PDU session when the UE detects that the route verification condition is not met, the PDU session being a session established by the UE associated with the network slice.

The first session indication information and the second session indication information may refer to the related descriptions in the method 200, and are not described herein.

Optionally, when the usage time of the network slice is changed, the AMF may determine whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, the usage time of the network slice, and the UE location, and when the UE does not meet the requirement, for example, the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice and/or the current time exceeds the available time of the network slice. The AMF sends timing information to the UE, the timing information is used for indicating the UE to release a PDU session before the time indicated by the timing information is overtime, and a service network of the PDU session is the network slice. Reference may be made in particular to the following description of method 500.

The following describes in detail a communication method of a network slice provided by the present application with reference to fig. 15, and fig. 15 is a schematic flowchart of a communication method 400 of a network slice of the present application. The method 400 may be applied to the application scenario described above, but may also be applied to other communication scenarios, and the application is not limited herein.

As shown in fig. 15, the method 400 shown in fig. 15 may include S410 to S480. The various steps in method 400 are described in detail below in conjunction with fig. 15.

S410, the SMF obtains information of a network slice, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice.

It should be appreciated that the identification information of the network slice, the first time indication information and the description of the first location indication information may refer to the related descriptions in the above method 200, and are not repeated herein.

Alternatively, the SMF acquiring the information of the network slice may include the following manner.

In a first possible implementation, NSMF sends the network slice information to the SMF. Accordingly, the SMF receives the network slice information sent by the NSMF.

In a second possible implementation, the NSMF configures the information of the network slice on the SMF.

In a third possible implementation, the NSMF sends the network slice information to the SMF through UDM/NSSF.

For example, the NSMF sends the information of the network slice to the UDM/NSSF. Accordingly, the UDM/NSSF receives and transmits the network slice information to the SMF.

For another example, the NSMF configures the network slice information on the UDM/NSSF. The UDM/NSSF sends the information of the network slice to the SMF.

Optionally, the SMF may also send the information of the network slice to the AMF, so that the AMF stores the information of the network slice. The AMF, NSSF, or UDM stores information of the network slice, so that when the UE applies to join the network slice, the NSSF, AMF, or UDM determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the first time indication information and the first location indication information of the network slice. The process of determining, by the network side, whether the UE can use the network slice according to the information of the network slice when the UE applies to join the network slice may refer to the description related to S250 in the method 200.

And S420, in the case that the SMF determines that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, the SMF determines the release of the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice. Wherein, the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that is, the current time of the UE exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

Optionally, the SMF may determine, according to the location information of the UE, whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice. Such as the SMF may subscribe to the AMF for location information of the UE. If the SMF may send the identification information of the terminal device to the AMF, the AMF may instruct the AMF to report the location information of the UE, and the AMF may report to the SMF whether the UE is in the available location area of the network slice. And the SMF determines whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice according to whether the UE is in the available position area of the network slice reported by the AMF. Of course, the SMF may subscribe to the AMF for the location of the UE in other ways.

Alternatively, the SMF may determine whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the current time. If the current time exceeds the available time of the network slice, the SMF determines that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice.

After determining the release of the PDU session, the SMF may trigger the UE to release the PDU session, or may directly release the PDU session itself, or both. The SMF triggers the UE to release the PDU session as described below with reference to steps S430-S570. The SMF itself directly releases the PDU session as described below with reference to step S480.

S430, the SMF sends first timing information to the UE, where the first timing information is used to instruct the UE to initiate a request for releasing a PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE before a time indicated by the first timing information expires.

S440, the UE receives the first timing information sent by the SMF.

S450, the SMF sends a cause value to the UE that denies the UE access to the network slice.

When the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current time of the UE exceeds the available time of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the UE to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the UE exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice, and the reason value for rejecting the UE to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

Alternatively, step S430 and step S450 may be the same message, and the SMF may simultaneously transmit the first timing information and the cause value to the UE.

Optionally, the SMF may send the first timing information and/or the cause value through a terminal device update (User Equipment Configuration update, UCU) procedure.

Alternatively, step S430 and step S450 may be performed only one of them.

S460, the UE receives the reason value which is sent by the SMF and refuses the UE to access the network slice.

And S470, the UE initiates a request for releasing the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice according to the first timing information and/or the reason value, and releases the PDU session.

For example, when the UE only receives the first timing information, the UE initiates a request for releasing the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE before the time indicated by the first timing information expires, releasing the PDU session.

For another example, when the UE receives only the cause value, the UE may immediately initiate a request to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE, releasing the PDU session; or the UE selects to initiate a request for releasing the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice at a certain time according to the actual situation of the UE, and releases the PDU session.

For another example, the UE receives the first timing information and the cause value at the same time, and the UE initiates a request for releasing the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE before the time indicated by the first timing information expires, and releases the PDU session.

Alternatively, the UE may update the network slice as an unavailable network slice, e.g., the UE deletes the identification information of the network slice from a locally stored list of identification information of allowed network slices. The UE re-evaluates the urs rules associated with the corresponding network slice, including whether the RSD (or urs) of the corresponding network slice is illegal, etc.

Optionally, the UE receives configuration information sent by the network side device, where the configuration information includes identification information of the rejected network slice; the UE deletes the identification information of the network slice from the locally stored list of identification information of allowed network slices.

Alternatively, the UE may initiate a new PDU session, such as re-evaluating the urs, determining from the new urs whether a new network slice can be associated, initiating a new PDU session.

And S480, the SMF does not receive a request sent by the UE to release the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice, and the SMF determines the release of the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice.

For example, the SMF immediately releases the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

For another example, the SMF determines second timing information, and upon time-out of the second timing information, the SMF releases the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

Alternatively, the first timing information may be less than or equal to the second timing information. The first timing information is a time for the UE to release the PDU session associated with the network slice and the second timing information is a time for the SMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice. The first timing information and the second timing information may be timers, such as 1 second for the first timing information and 2 seconds for the second timing information. The UE releases the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE within 1 second and the SMF releases the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE within 2 seconds.

The SMF sets the first timing information and the second timing information, so that the UE side can not immediately stop the ongoing service, the first timing information is smaller than the second timing information, the reserved time for the UE side is more sufficient, and the user experience can be improved.

It should be appreciated that the step S480 is an optional step, and the SMF may actively release the PDU session when the UE does not release the PDU session.

In the method 400, the SMF indicates the UE to release the PDU session according to the information of the network slice, or the SMF actively releases the PDU session when the UE does not successfully release the PDU session, thereby realizing flexible deployment of the network slice and achieving the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area. Meanwhile, the SMF can set timing information to indicate the UE to release PDU session or actively release PDU session, and the timing information can prevent the service of the UE from being cut off instantaneously, thereby improving the feeling of the user.

The following describes in detail a communication method of a network slice provided by the present application with reference to fig. 16, and fig. 16 is a schematic flowchart of a communication method 500 of a network slice of the present application. The method 500 may be applied to the application scenario described above, but may also be applied to other communication scenarios, and the application is not limited herein.

As shown in fig. 16, the method 500 shown in fig. 16 may include S510 to S580. The various steps in method 500 are described in detail below in conjunction with fig. 16.

S510, the AMF acquires information of a network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further comprises first time indication information and/or second position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice.

The specific process of the AMF to obtain the information of the network slice may refer to the description of step S310, which is not repeated here.

Optionally, in the process of acquiring the information of the network slice, the AMF may store the information of the network slice in an NSSF or a UDM, where the AMF, the NSSF or the UDM stores the information of the network slice, so that when the UE applies to join the network slice, the NSSF or the AMF or the UDM determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the first time indication information and the first location indication information of the network slice. When the UE applies to join the network slice, the process of determining whether the UE can use the network slice according to the information of the network slice may refer to the related description in step S250, which is not repeated herein.

And S520, in the case that the AMF determines that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, the AMF determines the release of the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice or a local data network. Wherein, the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that is, the current time of the UE exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

Optionally, the AMF may determine, according to the location information of the UE, whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice. The AMF may subscribe (or acquire) the location information of the UE to the RAN according to the information of the network slice, the AMF may set a reporting area (Presence Reporting Area, PRA) according to the first location indication information of the network slice, and send the PRA to the RAN, the RAN reports the actual location of the UE, and the AMF may determine whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the current actual location information of the UE. Of course, the AMF may subscribe to the location of the UE with the RAN in other ways as well.

Optionally, the AMF may determine, according to the current time, whether the UE meets the requirement of accessing the network slice. If the current time exceeds the available time of the network slice, the AMF determines that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice.

After the AMF determines the release of the PDU session, the UE may be triggered to release the PDU session, or the SMF may be triggered to release the PDU session, or both. The AMF triggering the UE to release the PDU session may be described with reference to the following steps S530-S570. The AMF triggering the SMF to release the PDU session may be described with reference to step S580 below.

And S530, the AMF sends first timing information to the UE, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the UE to initiate a request for releasing the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice or the local data network before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime.

S540, the UE receives the first timing information sent by the AMF.

S550, the AMF sends a cause value to the UE that denies the UE access to the network slice.

Alternatively, step S530 and step S550 may be the same message, and the AMF may simultaneously transmit the first timing information and the cause value to the UE.

Optionally, the AMF may send the first timing information and/or the cause value through UCU flow.

Alternatively, step S530 and step S550 may be performed only one of them.

S560, the UE receives the reason value which is sent by the AMF and refuses the UE to access the network slice.

S570, the UE initiates a request for releasing the PDU session associated with the network slice, which is established by the UE, according to the first timing information and/or the cause value, and releases the PDU session.

The operation of the UE may refer to the description of S470 and will not be described here.

S580, the AMF does not receive the request sent by the UE to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE, and determines release of the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

For example, the AMF immediately sends a request to the SMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

For another example, the AMF determines second timing information, upon a time-out of the second timing information, the AMF sends a request to the SMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

Alternatively, the first timing information may be less than or equal to the second timing information. The first timing information is a time for the UE to release the PDU session associated with the network slice and the second timing information is a time for the AMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice. The first timing information and the second timing information may be timers, such as 1 second for the first timing information and 2 seconds for the second timing information. The UE releases the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE within 1 second, and the AMF sends a request to the SMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE within 2 seconds.

The AMF sets the first timing information and the second timing information, so that the UE side can not immediately stop the ongoing service, the first timing information is smaller than the second timing information, the reserved time for the UE side is more sufficient, and the user experience can be improved.

It should be appreciated that this step S580 is an optional step, and that when the UE does not release the PDU session, the AMF may send a request to the SMF to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

In the method 500, the AMF indicates the UE to release the PDU session according to the information of the network slice, or when the UE does not successfully release the PDU session, the AMF may send a request for releasing the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE to the SMF, thereby implementing flexible deployment of the network slice, and achieving the effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area. Meanwhile, the SMF can set timing information to indicate the UE to release PDU session or actively release PDU session, and the timing information can prevent the service of the UE from being cut off instantaneously, thereby improving the feeling of the user.

The following describes in detail a communication method of a network slice provided by the present application with reference to fig. 17, and fig. 17 is a schematic flowchart of a communication method 600 of a network slice of the present application. The method 600 may be applied to the application scenario described above, but may also be applied to other communication scenarios, and the application is not limited herein.

As shown in fig. 17, the method 600 shown in fig. 17 may include S610 to S690. The various steps in method 600 are described in detail below in conjunction with fig. 17.

The AMF obtains information of a network slice, where the information of the network slice includes S-nsai of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice.

Alternatively, the specific process of the AMF to obtain the information of the network slice may refer to the description of step S310, which is not repeated here.

Optionally, in the process of acquiring the information of the network slice, the AMF, NSSF or UDM may store the information of the network slice, and the AMF, NSSF or UDM stores the information of the network slice, so that when the UE applies to join the network slice, the NSSF or AMF or UDM determines whether the UE can use the network slice according to the first time indication information and the first location indication information of the network slice. The process of determining, by the network side, whether the UE can use the network slice according to the information of the network slice when the UE applies to join the network slice may refer to the description related to S250 in the method 200.

S620, the AMF sends the information of the network slice to the access network device RAN.

Alternatively, the AMF may send the information of the network slice to the RAN via a registration accept message.

Alternatively, the AMF may send the information of the network slice to the RAN via a UE update configuration message.

S630, the RAN receives the information of the network slice sent by the AMF.

S640, the RAN broadcasts the identification information of the supported network slice in the corresponding cell.

Optionally, when the information of the network slice includes the identification information and the first time indication information of the network slice, the RAN broadcasts the identification information and the first time indication information of the supported network slice within the time indicated by the first time indication information of the network slice. When the UE receives the identification information of the network slice and the first time indication information, if a PDU session associated with the network slice is being performed on the UE, the UE may initiate a request for releasing the PDU session according to the first time indication information before a time indicated by the first time indication information is overtime.

Optionally, when the information of the network slice includes the identification information and the first location indication information of the network slice, the RAN broadcasts the identification information and the first location indication information of the supported network slice in the cell indicated by the first location indication information of the network slice. When the UE receives the identification information of the network slice and the first location indication information, if a PDU session associated with the network slice is being performed on the UE, the UE may initiate a request for releasing the PDU session according to the first location indication information when the UE moves outside a location area indicated by the first location indication information.

Optionally, when the information of the network slice includes the identification information, the first location indication information and the first time indication information of the network slice, the RAN broadcasts the supported information of the network slice in the cell indicated by the first location indication information within the time indicated by the first time indication information of the network slice. When the UE receives the identification information of the network slice, the first location indication information and the first time indication information, if a PDU session associated with the network slice is being performed on the UE, the UE may initiate a request to release the PDU session according to the first time indication information and the first location indication information, e.g., before a time indicated by the first time indication information expires and/or when the UE moves outside a location area indicated by the first location indication information.

When the received information of the network slice comprises the first position indication information, the RAN broadcasts the supported information of the network slice in the cell indicated by the first position indication information of the network slice, and does not broadcast in other cells, so that signaling overhead can be saved, and network resources can be saved.

S650, when the RAN determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the RAN determines release of the PDU session associated with the network slice, which is established by the UE. Wherein, the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that is, the current time of the UE exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

After determining the release of the PDU session, the RAN may trigger the UE to release the PDU session, or may trigger the SMF to release the PDU session, or both. The RAN triggering the UE to release the PDU session may be described with reference to the following steps S660-S670. The RAN triggering the SMF to release the PDU session may be described with reference to steps S680 and S690 below.

S660, the RAN sends first timing information, where the first timing information is used to instruct the terminal device to initiate a release request of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice before a time indicated by the first timing information expires.

For example, the RAN may send the first timing information to the UE by broadcasting or unicasting.

For example, if the RAN determines, according to the first time indication information, that the UE does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, this means that the available time of the network slice is already cut off, that is, that other UEs served by the network slice do not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, so the RAN may broadcast the first time information, and each UE receiving the broadcast first time information may initiate a release request of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first time information expires.

For another example, if the RAN determines, according to the first location indication information, that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that means that the location of the current UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice, the RAN may unicast the first timing information to the UE, and the UE that receives the timing information may initiate a release request of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first timing information expires.

Alternatively, the RAN may broadcast a message according to the AMF, SMF indications. For example, if the AMF and the SMF determine that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the AMF and the SMF may send the indication information to the RAN, where the indication information includes the first timing information, the indication information is used to instruct the RAN to broadcast the first timing information, the RAN receives the indication information, and the RAN broadcasts a message, where the broadcast message includes the first timing information.

S670, the UE receives the first timing information.

Optionally, the RAN sends a cause value to the UE that denies the UE access to the network slice.

The reason value for rejecting the UE to access the network slice may refer to the description of fig. 12, which is not repeated here.

Alternatively, the RAN may simultaneously transmit the first timing information and the cause value to the UE.

Alternatively, the RAN may perform only one of the steps of transmitting the cause value to the UE, and transmitting the first timing information to the UE.

Optionally, the manner in which the RAN sends the cause value to the UE may refer to the manner in which the RAN sends the first timing information to the UE, which is not described herein.

And when the UE receives the first timing information and/or the reason value, initiating a request for releasing the PDU session which is established by the UE and is associated with the network slice, and releasing the PDU session.

Optionally, the UE initiates a request for releasing the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE, and the process of releasing the PDU session may refer to the description of fig. 12, which is not repeated herein.

It should be understood that, when the UE initiates a request for releasing the PDU session associated with the network slice, which is established by the UE, the UE may update the local configuration while releasing the PDU session, and the specific method is described with reference to fig. 14, which is not repeated herein.

And S680, the RAN determines to release the PDU session established by the UE and associated with the network slice under the condition that the RAN determines that the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice. Wherein, the UE does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that is, the current time of the UE exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the UE exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

For example, in the event that the RAN determines that the UE does not meet the requirements for accessing the network slice, the RAN immediately informs the AMF that the network slice is not available in a tracking area, which is a cell under coverage by the RAN.

For another example, the RAN determines second timing information, and upon time-out of the second timing information, the RAN informs the AMF that the network slice is not available in a tracking area, which is a cell covered by the RAN.

Specifically, when the time of the second timing information expires, the RAN sends an interface configuration update (NG configuration update) message to the AMF, the interface configuration update message being used to inform the AMF that the current network slice is not available at the current TA, which is a cell under coverage by the RAN.

Alternatively, the first timing information may be less than or equal to the second timing information. The first timing information is a time for the UE to release the PDU session associated with the network slice, the second timing information is a time for the RAN to release the PDU session associated with the network slice, and the first timing information and the second timing information may be timers, such as 1 second for the first timing information and 2 seconds for the second timing information. The UE releases the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE within 1 second and the RAN notifies the AMF that the network slice is not available in the tracking area within 2 seconds.

The RAN sets the first timing information and the second timing information, so that the UE side can not stop the ongoing service immediately, the first timing information is smaller than the second timing information, the reserved time for the UE side is more sufficient, and the experience of the user can be improved.

S690, the AMF receives the interface configuration update message, triggering a request to release the PDU session associated with the network slice established by the UE.

It should be appreciated that the steps S680 and S690 are optional steps, and the RAN may actively initiate release of the PDU session when the UE does not release the PDU session.

In the method 600, the RAN generates first timing information according to information of a network slice, where the first timing information is used to instruct the UE to release a PDU session before time indicated by the first timing information is overtime, or the RAN sends an interface configuration update message to the AMF before time indicated by the second timing information is overtime, where the interface configuration update message is used to notify the AMF that the network slice is not available in a tracking area TA, thereby implementing flexible network slice deployment, and achieving an effect that the network slice is used in a specific time and a specific area. Meanwhile, the timing information can prevent the service of the UE from being cut off instantaneously, so that the feeling of the user is improved.

It should also be appreciated that method 400, method 500, and method 600 may be used in conjunction with method 200, method 200 describing how a UE accesses a network slice, method 400, method 500, and method 600 describing how a UE that has accessed a network slice releases a PDU session for which the serving network is the network slice when information for the network slice is updated.

Alternatively, when the above-mentioned methods 200, 300, 400, 500 and 600 are applied to the network architecture of the LBO roaming scenario, the SMF is vSMF, the AMF is vmsf, and the PCF is hPCF. The NSMF may be vNSMF or hNSMF. When the UE acquires the S-nsai, the UE queries the allowed nsai and the mapping of the allowed nsai to the subscribed S-nsai, and if the S-nsaa is the allowed nsai and there is a mapping of the allowed nsai to the subscribed S-nsai, the UE may perform the steps of the methods 200, 300, 400, 500, and 600.

Alternatively, when the above-mentioned methods 200, 300, 400, 500 and 600 are applied to the network architecture of the HR roaming scenario, the SMF is vSMF, the AMF is vmsf, and the PCF is hPCF. The NSMF may be vNSMF or hNSMF. When the UE acquires the S-nsai, the UE queries the allowed nsai and the mapping of the allowed nsai to the subscribed S-nsai, and if the S-nsaa is the allowed nsai and there is a mapping of the allowed nsai to the subscribed S-nsai, the UE may perform the steps of the methods 200, 300, 400, 500, and 600.

Alternatively, the information of the network slice may be configured on the RAN (may be configured by an operator), and the RAN may report the information to the AMF (e.g. report the information when the link is established) through the N2 interface, where the AMF further reports the information to the NSSF or other network elements. This implementation may be applied in the methods 200, 300, 400, 500, and 600 described above.

Optionally, the information of the network slice may further include service information, where the service information is used to indicate a service, and a service network of the service is the network slice.

Optionally, the service information may include one or more of the following information:

such as application identification of the service, IP 3 tuple of the service, service information in other TDs, etc.

It should be understood that the network slice may also be expressed as a slice in which traffic can only be used at a corresponding location or time window.

It will be appreciated that the above is only provided to assist those skilled in the art in better understanding the present application and is not intended to limit the scope of the present application. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the foregoing examples that various equivalent modifications or variations can be made, for example, some of the steps of the methods described above may not be necessary, or some steps may be newly added, etc. Or a combination of any two or more of the above. Such modifications, variations, or combinations are also within the scope of the present application.

It should be further understood that the sequence numbers of the above processes do not mean the order of execution, and the order of execution of the processes should be determined by the functions and the internal logic, and should not constitute any limitation on the implementation process of the present application.

A communication method of a network slice of the present application is described in detail above with reference to fig. 1 to 17, and a communication apparatus of the present application will be described in detail below with reference to fig. 18 to 21.

Fig. 18 shows a schematic block diagram of a communication device 700 of the present application.

In some embodiments, the communication device 700 may be a terminal device, or may be a chip or a circuit, for example, may be provided in the terminal device.

In some embodiments, the communication apparatus 700 may be an access network device, or may be a chip or a circuit, for example, may be disposed on the access network device.

In some embodiments, the communication apparatus 700 may be a core network device (such as a policy control function network element, a session management function network element, an access and mobility management function network element), or may be a chip or a circuit, for example, may be disposed on the core network device.

In one possible approach, the communication device 700 may include a processing unit 710 (i.e., an example of a processor) and a transceiver unit 730. In some possible implementations, the processing unit 710 may also be referred to as a determination unit. In some possible implementations, the transceiver unit 730 may include a receiving unit and a transmitting unit.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 may be implemented by a transceiver or transceiver-related circuit or interface circuit.

In one implementation, the communication device may also include a storage unit 720. In one possible implementation, the memory unit 720 is configured to store instructions. In one implementation, the storage unit may also be used to store data or information. The storage unit 720 may be implemented by a memory.

In some possible designs, the processing unit 710 is configured to execute the instructions stored in the storage unit 720, so that the communications device 700 implements the steps performed by the policy control function network element in the above method. Alternatively, the processing unit 710 may be configured to invoke the data of the storage unit 720, so that the communication device 700 implements the steps performed by the policy control function network element in the method as described above.

In some possible designs, the processing unit 710 is configured to execute the instructions stored in the storage unit 720, so that the communications device 700 implements the steps performed by the network element with access and mobility management functions in the method described above. Alternatively, the processing unit 710 may be configured to invoke the data of the storage unit 720 to cause the communication device 700 to implement the steps performed by the network element of the access and mobility management function in the method as described above.

In some possible designs, the processing unit 710 is configured to execute the instructions stored in the storage unit 720, so that the communication device 700 implements the steps performed by the session management function network element in the above method. Alternatively, the processing unit 710 may be configured to invoke the data of the storage unit 720 to cause the communication device 700 to implement the steps performed by the session management function network element as in the method described above.

In some possible designs, the processing unit 710 is configured to execute the instructions stored in the storage unit 720, so that the communication apparatus 700 implements the steps performed by the terminal device in the above method. Alternatively, the processing unit 710 may be configured to invoke the data of the storage unit 720 to cause the communication device 700 to implement the steps performed by the terminal device in the method as described above.

In some possible designs, the processing unit 710 is configured to execute the instructions stored in the storage unit 720, so that the communication apparatus 700 implements the steps performed by the access network device in the method described above. Alternatively, the processing unit 710 may be configured to invoke the data of the storage unit 720, so that the communication apparatus 700 implements the steps performed by the access network device as in the method described above.

For example, the processing unit 710, the storage unit 720, and the transceiver unit 730 may communicate with each other via an internal connection path to transfer control and/or data signals. For example, the storage unit 720 is configured to store a computer program, and the processing unit 710 may be configured to invoke and execute the computer program from the storage unit 720 to control the transceiver unit 730 to receive signals and/or send signals, so as to perform the steps of the session management function element, the policy control function element, the access and mobility management function element, the terminal device, or the access network device in the above method. The memory unit 720 may be integrated in the processing unit 710 or may be provided separately from the processing unit 710.

Alternatively, if the communication apparatus 700 is a communication device (e.g., a terminal device, or an access network device), the transceiver unit 730 includes a receiver and a transmitter. Wherein the receiver and the transmitter may be the same or different physical entities. Which are the same physical entities, may be collectively referred to as transceivers.

When the communication apparatus 700 is a terminal device or the communication apparatus is an access network device or a core network device, the transceiver unit 730 may be a transmitting unit or a transmitter when transmitting information, the transceiver unit 730 may be a receiving unit or a receiver when receiving information, the transceiver unit may be a transceiver, the transmitter or the receiver may be a radio frequency circuit, and when the communication apparatus includes a storage unit, the storage unit is configured to store computer instructions, the processor is communicatively connected to the memory, and the processor executes the computer instructions stored in the memory, so that the communication apparatus may perform any one of the methods 300 to 700. The processor may be a general purpose Central Processing Unit (CPU), microprocessor, application specific integrated circuit (Application Specific Intergrated Circuit, ASIC).

Optionally, if the communication device 700 is a chip or a circuit, the transceiver unit 730 includes an input interface and an output interface.

When the communication device 700 is a chip, the transceiver unit 730 may be an input and/or output interface, pins or circuits, etc. The processing unit 710 may execute computer-executable instructions stored by the storage unit to enable the communication device to perform the method 200, the method 500, or the method 600. Alternatively, the storage unit is a storage unit in the chip, such as a register, a cache, or the like, and the storage unit may also be a storage unit in the terminal located outside the chip, such as a Read Only Memory (ROM) or other type of static storage device that may store static information and instructions, a random access Memory (Random Access Memory, RAM), or the like.

As an implementation, the function of the transceiver unit 730 may be considered to be implemented by a transceiver circuit or a dedicated chip for transceiving. The processing unit 710 may be considered to be implemented by a dedicated processing chip, a processing circuit, a processing unit, or a general-purpose chip.

As another implementation manner, a manner of using a general-purpose computer to implement the communication device (such as a terminal device, a core network device, or an access network device) provided by the embodiment of the present application may be considered. Program codes for realizing the functions of the processing unit 710 and the transceiver unit 730 are stored in the memory unit 720, and the general-purpose processing unit realizes the functions of the processing unit 710 and the transceiver unit 730 by executing the codes in the memory unit 720.

In some embodiments, the communication device 700 may be a policy control function network element, or a chip or a circuit disposed in the policy control function network element. When the communication device 700 is a network element with a policy control function, or a chip or a circuit disposed in the network element with the policy control function, the transceiver unit 730 is configured to obtain information of a network slice, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice, and the processing unit 710 is configured to generate user routing policy information according to the information of the network slice; the transceiver unit 730 is further configured to send the user routing policy information to the terminal device through the access and mobility management function network element.

In one implementation, the user routing policy information includes a first user routing policy rule, where the first user routing policy rule includes identification information of the network slice and identification information of an application program served by the network slice, and the first user routing policy rule further includes a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice, where the first time window is less than or equal to an available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the first location range is less than or equal to an available location area indicated by the first location indication information.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 is specifically configured to: receiving information of the network slice from a network slice management function network element; or, receiving information of the network slice from the access and mobility management function network element; or, information from the unified data store for the network slice is received.

When the communication device 700 is configured in or is a policy control function network element, each module or unit in the communication device 700 may be used to execute each action or process executed by the policy control function network element in the above method, and detailed descriptions thereof are omitted herein for avoiding redundant descriptions.

In some embodiments, the communication device 700 may be an access and mobility management function network element, or a chip or circuit provided in the access and mobility management function network element. When the communication device 700 is an access and mobility management function network element, or a chip or a circuit disposed in the access and mobility management function network element, the transceiver unit 730 is configured to obtain information of a network slice, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice; the processing unit 710 is configured to process the information of the network slice.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 is specifically configured to: and sending the information of the network slice to a strategy control function network element.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is specifically configured to: generating local data network information according to the information of the network slice, wherein the local data network information comprises the name of a local data network, the local data network information further comprises second time indication information and/or second position indication information, the second time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the local data network, the second position indication information is used for indicating the available cell of the local data network, the available time indicated by the second time indication information is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the available cell indicated by the second position indication information is smaller than or equal to the available position area indicated by the first position indication information; the transceiver unit is further configured to send the local data network information to a terminal device.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 is further configured to: and sending the name of the local data network corresponding to the network slice to a strategy control function network element.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 is further configured to: and sending the second time indication information and/or the second position indication information to a strategy control function network element.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is specifically configured to: the transceiver unit 730 is specifically configured to: and under the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, sending first timing information to the terminal equipment, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the terminal equipment to release a protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice or the local data network before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime, and the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is specifically configured to: the transceiver unit 730 is specifically configured to: under the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, sending a reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice to the terminal equipment, wherein when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice, the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is specifically configured to: determining second timing information under the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, wherein the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice; the transceiver unit 730 is further configured to: and when the time of the second timing information is over, sending a request for releasing the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice or the local data network to a session management function network element.

In one implementation, the first timing information is less than or equal to the second timing information.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 is specifically configured to: receiving information of the network slice from a network slice management function network element; or, receiving information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or, information of the network slice from the network slice selection function network element is received.

When the communication device 700 is configured in or is an access and mobility management function network element, each module or unit in the communication device 700 may be used to perform each action or process performed by the access and mobility management function network element in the above method, and detailed descriptions thereof are omitted herein for avoiding redundancy.

In some embodiments, the communication device 700 may be a session management function network element, or a chip or a circuit provided in the session management function network element. When the communication device 700 is a session management function network element, or a chip or a circuit disposed in the session management function network element, the transceiver unit 730 is configured to obtain information of a network slice, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice; the processing unit 710 is configured to determine, when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, release of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device, where the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice refers to that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

In one implementation, the transceiver unit 730 is further configured to: and sending first timing information to the terminal equipment, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the terminal equipment to release the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is further configured to: determining that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice; the receiving and transmitting unit is further configured to send, to the terminal device, a cause value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice if the session management function network element determines, according to the network slice information, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, where when the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice is that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice, the cause value for rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice is used to indicate that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is further configured to: determining second timing information under the condition that the information of the network slice determines that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, wherein the condition that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice means that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice; and when the time of the second timing information is over, the session management function network element releases the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice.

When the communication device 700 is configured in or is a session management function network element, each module or unit in the communication device 700 may be used to perform each action or process performed by the session management function network element in the above method, and detailed descriptions thereof are omitted herein for avoiding redundancy.

In some embodiments, the communication apparatus 700 may be an access network device, or a chip or a circuit disposed in the access network device. When the communication apparatus 700 is an access network device, or a chip or a circuit disposed in the access network device, the transceiver unit 730 is configured to receive information of a network slice sent by an access and mobility management function network element, where the information of the network slice includes identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information of the network slice, where the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the network slice, and the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the network slice; the processing unit 710 is configured to determine, when the access network device determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, release a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice, where the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current location of the terminal device exceeds the available location area of the network slice.

In one implementation, the determining by the access network device to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device includes: the access network device instructs the terminal device to initiate release of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice before a time indicated by the first timing information expires through a broadcast message or a unicast message.

In one implementation, the determining by the access network device to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device includes: the access network equipment sends a reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice to the terminal equipment, wherein when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice, the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, and the reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

In one implementation, the access network device determines to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device, and further includes: and when the time of the second timing information is over, the access network equipment informs the access and mobile management function network element that the network slice is not available in a tracking area, wherein the tracking area is a cell covered by the access network equipment.

When the communication apparatus 700 is configured in or is an access network device, each module or unit in the communication apparatus 700 may be used to perform each action or process performed by the access network device in the above method, and detailed descriptions thereof are omitted for avoiding redundancy.

In some embodiments, the communication apparatus 700 may be a terminal device, or a chip or a circuit provided in the terminal device. When the communication apparatus 700 is a terminal device, or a chip or a circuit disposed on the terminal device, the transceiver unit 730 is configured to receive first timing information sent by a network device, where the first timing information is used to instruct the terminal device to release a protocol data unit session associated with a network slice established by the terminal device within a time indicated by the first timing information, and the identification information of the network slice is identification information of the network slice; the processing unit 710 is configured to release the protocol data unit session before the time indicated by the first timing information expires.

In one implementation, when the network device is an access network device, the transceiver unit 730 receives the first timing information through a broadcast message or a unicast message.

In one implementation, when the network device is a core network device, the transceiver unit 730 receives the first timing information through a configuration update message of the terminal device.

In one implementation manner, the terminal device receives a reason value sent by a network device for refusing the terminal device to access the network slice, where when the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, and the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice, the reason value refusing the terminal device to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, if the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, the reason value of refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

In one implementation, when the network device is an access network device, the terminal device receives the cause value through a broadcast message or a unicast message.

In one implementation, when the network device is a core network device, the terminal device receives the cause value through a configuration update message of the terminal device.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is further configured to: the identification information of the network slice is deleted from the locally stored list of allowed network slice selection assistance information.

When the communication apparatus 700 is configured in or is a terminal device, each module or unit in the communication apparatus 700 may be used to perform each action or process performed by the terminal device in the above method, and detailed descriptions thereof are omitted herein for avoiding redundancy.

In some embodiments, the communication apparatus 700 may be a terminal device, or a chip or a circuit provided in the terminal device. When the communication apparatus 700 is a terminal device, or is a chip or a circuit disposed in the terminal device, the transceiver unit 730 is configured to receive local data network information sent by an access and mobility management function network element, where the local data network information includes a name of a local data network, the local data network information further includes first time indication information and/or first location indication information, the first time indication information is used to indicate an available time of the local data network, the first location indication information is used to indicate an available location area of the local data network, and the available location area indicated by the first location indication information is a cell granularity; the processing unit 710 is configured to determine whether the terminal device can access the local data network according to the local data network information.

In one implementation, the processing unit 710 is specifically configured to: when the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time indicated by the first time indication information, the terminal equipment is not accessed to the local data network; or when the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area indicated by the first position indication information, the terminal equipment does not access the local data network.

The concepts related to the configuration of the communication device 700 and the technical solutions provided by the present application are explained and detailed and other steps are referred to in the foregoing methods or descriptions of other embodiments, and are not repeated herein.

It should be noted that, in the present application, the processing unit 710 may be implemented by a processor, the storage unit 720 may be implemented by a memory, and the transceiver unit 730 may be implemented by a transceiver, as shown in fig. 19, and fig. 19 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication device 800 provided in the present application. Communication device 800 may include a processor 810, a memory 820, and a transceiver 830. The processor 810, the memory 820, and the transceiver 830 are used to implement the functions of the processing unit 710, the storage unit 720, and the transceiver unit 730, respectively.

Fig. 20 is a schematic structural diagram of a terminal device 900 according to the present application. The terminal device 900 may perform the actions performed by the terminal device in the above-described method embodiment.

For convenience of explanation, fig. 20 shows only major components of the terminal device. As shown in fig. 20, the terminal device 900 includes a processor, a memory, a control circuit, an antenna, and an input-output device.

The processor is mainly configured to process the communication protocol and the communication data, control the entire terminal device, execute a software program, and process the data of the software program, for example, to support the terminal device to execute the actions described in the above embodiment of the method for indicating the transmission precoding matrix. The memory is mainly used for storing software programs and data, for example, for storing the codebook described in the above embodiments. The control circuit is mainly used for converting baseband signals and radio frequency signals and processing the radio frequency signals. The control circuit together with the antenna, which may also be called a transceiver, is mainly used for receiving and transmitting radio frequency signals in the form of electromagnetic waves. Input and output devices, such as touch screens, display screens, keyboards, etc., are mainly used for receiving data input by a user and outputting data to the user.

When the terminal device is started, the processor can read the software program in the storage unit, interpret and execute the instructions of the software program, and process the data of the software program. When data is required to be transmitted wirelessly, the processor carries out baseband processing on the data to be transmitted and then outputs a baseband signal to the radio frequency circuit, and the radio frequency circuit carries out radio frequency processing on the baseband signal and then transmits the radio frequency signal outwards in the form of electromagnetic waves through the antenna. When data is sent to the terminal equipment, the radio frequency circuit receives a radio frequency signal through the antenna, converts the radio frequency signal into a baseband signal, and outputs the baseband signal to the processor, and the processor converts the baseband signal into data and processes the data.

Those skilled in the art will appreciate that fig. 20 shows only one memory and processor for ease of illustration. In an actual terminal device, there may be multiple processors and memories. The memory may also be referred to as a storage medium or storage device, etc., and embodiments of the present application are not limited in this respect.

For example, the processor may include a baseband processor, which is mainly used to process the communication protocol and the communication data, and a central processor, which is mainly used to control the entire terminal device, execute a software program, and process the data of the software program. The processor in fig. 20 integrates the functions of a baseband processor and a central processing unit, and those skilled in the art will appreciate that the baseband processor and the central processing unit may be separate processors, interconnected by bus technology, etc. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the terminal device may include multiple baseband processors to accommodate different network formats, and that the terminal device may include multiple central processors to enhance its processing capabilities, and that the various components of the terminal device may be connected by various buses. The baseband processor may also be expressed as a baseband processing circuit or a baseband processing chip. The central processing unit may also be expressed as a central processing circuit or a central processing chip. The function of processing the communication protocol and the communication data may be built in the processor, or may be stored in the storage unit in the form of a software program, which is executed by the processor to realize the baseband processing function.

For example, in the embodiment of the present application, the antenna and the control circuit having the transceiving function may be regarded as the transceiving unit 910 of the terminal device 900, and the processor having the processing function may be regarded as the processing unit 920 of the terminal device 900. As shown in fig. 20, the terminal device 900 includes a transceiving unit 910 and a processing unit 920. The transceiver unit may also be referred to as a transceiver, transceiver device, etc. Alternatively, the device for implementing the receiving function in the transceiver unit 910 may be regarded as a receiving unit, and the device for implementing the transmitting function in the transceiver unit 910 may be regarded as a transmitting unit, that is, the transceiver unit includes a receiving unit and a transmitting unit. For example, the receiving unit may also be referred to as a receiver, a receiving circuit, etc., and the transmitting unit may be referred to as a transmitter, a transmitting circuit, etc.

Fig. 21 is a schematic structural diagram of an access network device 1000 according to the present application, which may be used to implement the functions of the access network device in the above method. The access network device 1000 includes one or more radio frequency units, such as a remote radio frequency unit (remote radio unit, RRU) 1010 and one or more baseband units (BBU) (also referred to as digital units, DUs) 1020. The RRU1010 may be referred to as a transceiver unit, transceiver circuitry, or transceiver, etc., which may include at least one antenna 1011 and a radio frequency unit 1012. The RRU1010 is mainly configured to receive and transmit radio frequency signals and convert radio frequency signals to baseband signals, for example, to send signaling messages to a terminal device as described in the foregoing embodiments. The BBU1120 part is mainly used for performing baseband processing, controlling a base station, and the like. The RRU1110 and BBU1120 may be physically located together or physically separate, i.e., distributed base stations.

The BBU1020 is a control center of the base station, and may also be referred to as a processing unit, and is mainly configured to perform baseband processing functions, such as channel coding, multiplexing, modulation, spreading, and so on. For example, the BBU (processing unit) 1020 may be configured to control the access network device to perform the operation procedures described in the method embodiments above with respect to the access network device.

In one example, the BBU1020 may be configured by one or more single boards, where the multiple single boards may support radio access networks of a single access system (such as an LTE system, or a 5G system), or may support radio access networks of different access systems respectively. The BBU1020 further comprises a memory 1021 and a processor 1022. The memory 1021 is used to store necessary instructions and data. For example, the memory 1021 stores a codebook or the like in the above-described embodiment. The processor 1022 is configured to control the base station to perform necessary actions, for example, to control the base station to perform the operation procedures related to the network device in the above-described method embodiment. The memory 1021 and processor 1022 may serve one or more boards. That is, the memory and the processor may be separately provided on each board. It is also possible that multiple boards share the same memory and processor. In addition, each single board can be provided with necessary circuits.

In one possible implementation, with the development of system-on-chip (SoC) technology, all or part of the functions of the portions 1020 and 1010 may be implemented by SoC technology, for example, by a base station functional chip, where a processor, a memory, an antenna interface, and other devices are integrated, and a program of a base station related function is stored in the memory, and the processor executes the program to implement the related function of the base station. Optionally, the base station functional chip can also read the memory outside the chip to realize the relevant functions of the base station.

It should be understood that the configuration of the access network device illustrated in fig. 21 is only one possible configuration, and should not be construed as limiting the embodiments of the present application in any way. The application does not exclude the possibility of other forms of base station architecture that may occur in the future.

It should be appreciated that in embodiments of the present application, the processor may be a central processing unit (central processing unit, CPU), the processor may also be other general purpose processors, digital signal processors (digital signal processor, DSP), application specific integrated circuits (application specific integrated circuit, ASIC), off-the-shelf programmable gate arrays (field programmable gate array, FPGA) or other programmable logic devices, discrete gate or transistor logic devices, discrete hardware components, or the like. A general purpose processor may be a microprocessor or the processor may be any conventional processor or the like.

It should also be appreciated that the memory in embodiments of the present application may be either volatile memory or nonvolatile memory, or may include both volatile and nonvolatile memory. The nonvolatile 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. The volatile memory may be random access memory (random access memory, RAM) which acts as an external cache. By way of example but not limitation, many forms of random access memory (random access memory, RAM) are available, such as Static RAM (SRAM), dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM), synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory (SDRAM), double data rate synchronous dynamic random access memory (DDR SDRAM), enhanced Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory (ESDRAM), synchronous Link DRAM (SLDRAM), and direct memory bus RAM (DR RAM).

The above embodiments may be implemented in whole or in part by software, hardware, firmware, or any other combination. When implemented in software, the above-described embodiments may be implemented in whole or in part in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product comprises one or more computer instructions or computer programs. When the computer instructions or computer program are loaded or executed on a computer, the processes or functions described in accordance with embodiments of the present application are produced in whole or in part. The computer may be a general purpose computer, a special purpose computer, a computer network, or other programmable apparatus. The computer instructions may be stored in a computer-readable storage medium or transmitted from one computer-readable storage medium to another computer-readable storage medium, for example, the computer instructions may be transmitted from one website site, computer, server, or data center to another website site, computer, server, or data center by wired (e.g., infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.). The computer readable storage medium may be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer or a data storage device such as a server, data center, etc. that contains one or more sets of available media. The usable medium may be a magnetic medium (e.g., floppy disk, hard disk, magnetic tape), an optical medium (e.g., DVD), or a semiconductor medium. The semiconductor medium may be a solid state disk.

Embodiments of the present application also provide a computer readable medium storing a computer program code comprising instructions for performing the methods of network slicing of the present application of the above methods 200-600. The readable medium may be a read-only memory (ROM) or a random access memory (random access memory, RAM), as the application is not limited in this regard.

The application also provides a computer program product comprising instructions which, when executed, cause the core network device, terminal device, access network device to perform operations corresponding to the core network device, terminal device, access network device or terminal device of the above method.

The embodiment of the application also provides a communication system which comprises the communication device, the access network equipment and the terminal equipment provided by the application, and the communication system can finish the communication method of the network slice provided by the application.

The embodiment of the application also provides a system chip, which comprises: a processing unit, which may be, for example, a processor, and a communication unit, which may be, for example, an input/output interface, pins or circuitry, etc. The processing unit may execute the computer instructions to cause a chip in the communication device to perform a network slice communication method provided by the present application.

Optionally, the computer instructions are stored in a storage unit.

Alternatively, the storage unit is a storage unit in the chip, such as a register, a cache, etc., and the storage unit may also be a storage unit in the terminal located outside the chip, such as a ROM or other type of static storage device, a RAM, etc., that can store static information and instructions. The processor mentioned in any of the above may be a CPU, microprocessor, ASIC, or one or more integrated circuits for controlling the execution of the program of the communication method of network slice described above.

It should be understood that the terms "and/or" and "at least one of a or B" herein are merely one type of association relationship describing the associated object, meaning that there may be three relationships, e.g., a and/or B, may represent: a exists alone, A and B exist together, and B exists alone. In addition, the character "/" herein generally indicates that the front and rear associated objects are an "or" relationship.

Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the various illustrative elements and algorithm steps described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented as electronic hardware, or combinations of computer software and electronic hardware. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware or software depends upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the 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.

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

In the several embodiments provided by the present application, it should be understood that the disclosed systems, devices, and methods may be implemented in other manners. For example, the apparatus embodiments described above are merely illustrative, e.g., the division of the units is merely a logical function division, and there may be additional divisions when actually implemented, e.g., multiple units or components may be combined or integrated into another system, or some features may be omitted or not performed. Alternatively, the coupling or direct coupling or communication connection shown or discussed with each other may be an indirect coupling or communication connection via some interfaces, devices or units, which may be in electrical, mechanical or other form.

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

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

The functions, if implemented in the form of software functional units and sold or used as a stand-alone product, may be stored in a computer-readable storage medium. Based on this understanding, the technical solution of the present application may be embodied essentially or in a part contributing to the prior art or in a part of the technical solution, in the form of a software product stored in a storage medium, comprising several instructions for causing a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, a network device, etc.) to perform all or part of the steps of the method according to the embodiments of the present application. And the aforementioned storage medium includes: a U-disk, a removable hard disk, a Read-Only Memory (ROM), a random access Memory (Random Access Memory, RAM), a magnetic disk, or an optical disk, or other various media capable of storing program codes.

The foregoing is merely illustrative of the present application, and the present application is not limited thereto, and any person skilled in the art will readily recognize that variations or substitutions are within the scope of the present application. Therefore, the protection scope of the present application shall be subject to the protection scope of the claims.

Claims

1. A method of communication for network slicing, comprising:

the method comprises the steps that an access and mobile management function network element obtains information of a network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating available position areas of the network slice;

the access and mobility management function network element processes the information of the network slice.

2. The communication method according to claim 1, wherein the access and mobility management function network element processing the information of the network slice comprises:

and the access and mobile management function network element sends the information of the network slice to the strategy control function network element.

3. The communication method according to claim 1, wherein the access and mobility management function network element processing the information of the network slice comprises:

the access and mobility management function network element generates local data network information from the network slice information, the local data network information comprising a name of a local data network,

The local data network information further comprises second time indication information for indicating an available time of the local data network and/or second location indication information for indicating available cells of the local data network,

the available time indicated by the second time indication information is smaller than or equal to the available time indicated by the first time indication information, and the available cell indicated by the second position indication information is smaller than or equal to the available position area indicated by the first position indication information;

the access and mobility management function network element sends the local data network information to a terminal device.

4. A communication method according to claim 3, characterized in that the communication method further comprises:

and the access and mobile management function network element sends the name of the local data network corresponding to the network slice to the strategy control function network element.

5. The communication method according to claim 4, characterized in that the communication method further comprises:

the access and mobility management function network element sends the second time indication information and/or the second location indication information to a policy control function network element.

6. The communication method according to any of claims 1 to 5, wherein the access and mobility management function network element processes the information of the network slice, comprising:

in case the access and mobility management function network element determines, from the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the access and mobility management function network element sends first timing information to the terminal device, the first timing information being used to instruct the terminal device to initiate a release request of a protocol data unit session associated with the network slice or the local data network established by the terminal device before a time indicated by the first timing information expires,

wherein, the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, which means that the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal device exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

7. The communication method according to any of claims 1 to 6, wherein the access and mobility management function network element processes the information of the network slice, comprising:

In case the access and mobility management function network element determines, from the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the access and mobility management function network element sends to the terminal device a cause value rejecting the terminal device to access the network slice,

when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, if the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice, rejecting the reason value of the terminal equipment accessing the network slice is used for indicating that the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time of the network slice; or when the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, if the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice, the reason value of refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice is used for indicating that the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area of the network slice.

8. The communication method according to any of the claims 1 to 7, characterized in that the access and mobility management function network element processes the information of the network slice, comprising:

In case the access and mobility management function network element determines, based on the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement for accessing the network slice, the access and mobility management function network element determines second timing information,

wherein, the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, namely, the current time of the terminal device exceeds the available time of the network slice and/or the current position of the terminal device exceeds the available position area of the network slice;

and when the time of the second timing information is over, the access and mobile management function network element sends a request for releasing the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice or the local data network to a session management function network element.

9. The communication method according to any of claims 1 to 8, wherein the access and mobility management function network element obtaining information of network slices comprises:

the access and mobile management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the network slice management function network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

the access and mobile management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

The access and mobility management function network element receives information of the network slice from a network slice selection function network element.

10. A method of communication for network slicing, comprising:

the method comprises the steps that a session management function network element obtains information of a network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating available position areas of the network slice;

in case the session management function network element determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the session management function network element determines a release of a protocol data unit session established by the terminal device and associated with the network slice,

11. The communication method according to claim 10, characterized in that the communication method further comprises:

the session management function network element sends first timing information to the terminal device, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the terminal device to initiate a request for releasing a protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal device and is associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime.

12. The communication method according to claim 10 or 11, characterized in that the communication method further comprises:

under the condition that the session management function network element determines that the terminal equipment does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice, the session management function network element sends a reason value for refusing the terminal equipment to access the network slice to the terminal equipment,

13. The communication method according to any one of claims 10 to 12, characterized in that the communication method further comprises:

the session management function network element determines second timing information when the terminal device is determined to be not in compliance with the requirement of accessing the network slice according to the information of the network slice,

and when the time of the second timing information is over, the session management function network element releases the protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal equipment and is associated with the network slice.

14. The communication method according to any one of claims 10 to 13, wherein the session management function network element obtains information of a network slice, comprising:

the session management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the network slice management function network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

the session management function network element receives the information of the network slice from the unified data management network element; or alternatively, the first and second heat exchangers may be,

The session management function network element receives information of the network slice from a network slice selection function network element.

15. A method of communication for network slicing, comprising:

the method comprises the steps that access network equipment receives information of a network slice sent by an access and mobile management function network element, wherein the information of the network slice comprises identification information of the network slice, and the information of the network slice further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, and the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice;

in case the access network device determines, according to the information of the network slice, that the terminal device does not meet the requirement of accessing the network slice, the access network device determines to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device,

16. The communication method according to claim 15, wherein the access network device determining to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device comprises:

the access network device sends first timing information to the terminal device, wherein the first timing information is used for indicating the terminal device to initiate a request for releasing the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime.

17. A communication method according to claim 15 or 16, wherein the access network device determining to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device comprises:

the access network device sends a cause value to the terminal device that denies the terminal device access to the network slice,

18. The communication method according to any of claims 15 to 17, wherein the access network device determining to release the protocol data unit session associated with the network slice established by the terminal device, further comprises:

and when the time of the second timing information is over, the access network equipment informs the access and mobile management function network element that the network slice is unavailable in a tracking area, wherein the tracking area is a cell covered by the access network equipment.

19. A method of communication for network slicing, comprising:

the method comprises the steps that a terminal device receives first timing information sent by a network device, wherein the timing information is used for indicating the terminal device to release a protocol data unit session which is established by the terminal device and is associated with a network slice in time indicated by the timing information;

and the terminal equipment releases the protocol data unit session before the time indicated by the first timing information is overtime.

20. The communication method according to claim 19, wherein the terminal device receives the first timing information by a broadcast message or a unicast message when the network device is an access network device.

21. The communication method according to claim 19, wherein the terminal device receives the first timing information through a configuration update message of the terminal device when the network device is a core network device.

22. A method of communicating according to any of claims 19 to 21, wherein the method further comprises:

the terminal device receives a reason value sent by the network device for refusing the terminal device to access the network slice,

23. The communication method according to claim 22, wherein the terminal device receives the cause value by a broadcast message or a unicast message when the network device is an access network device.

24. The communication method according to claim 22, wherein the terminal device receives the cause value through a configuration update message of the terminal device when the network device is a core network device.

25. The communication method according to any one of claims 19 to 24, characterized in that the communication method further comprises:

the terminal device deletes the identification information of the network slice from a locally stored allowed network slice selection auxiliary information list.

26. A method of communication for network slicing, comprising:

the method comprises the steps that terminal equipment receives local data network information sent by an access and mobile management function network element, wherein the local data network information comprises a name of a local data network, the local data network information further comprises first time indication information and/or first position indication information, the first time indication information is used for indicating available time of the local data network, the first position indication information is used for indicating available position areas of the local data network, and the available position areas indicated by the first position indication information are cell granularity;

And the terminal equipment determines whether the terminal equipment can access the local data network according to the local data network information.

27. The communication method according to claim 26, wherein the terminal device determining whether the terminal device can use the local data network based on the local data network information, comprises:

when the current time of the terminal equipment exceeds the available time indicated by the first time indication information, the terminal equipment is not accessed to the local data network; or,

and when the current position of the terminal equipment exceeds the available position area indicated by the first position indication information, the terminal equipment is not accessed to the local data network.

28. A method of communication for network slicing, comprising:

the strategy control function network element obtains the information of the network slice, wherein the information of the network slice comprises the identification information of the network slice, the information of the network slice also comprises the first time indication information and/or the first position indication information of the network slice, wherein the first time indication information is used for indicating the available time of the network slice, the first position indication information is used for indicating the available position area of the network slice,

The strategy control function network element generates user routing strategy information according to the information of the network slice;

the policy control function network element sends the user routing policy information to the terminal equipment through the access and mobility management function network element.

29. The communication method according to claim 28, wherein the user routing policy information includes a first user routing policy rule, the first user routing policy rule including identification information of the network slice, identification information of an application program served by the network slice, the first user routing policy rule further including a first time window and/or a first location range corresponding to the network slice, the first time window being less than or equal to an available time indicated by the first time indication information, the first location range being less than or equal to an available location area indicated by the first location indication information.

30. A method of communicating according to claim 28 or 29, wherein the policy control function network element obtaining information of a network slice comprises:

the policy control function network element receives information of the network slice from a unified data store.

31. A communication device, comprising:

at least one processor, a memory and a transceiver, the memory for storing instructions, the transceiver for the management device to communicate with other devices, the stored instructions being executed directly or indirectly by the at least one processor to cause the communications apparatus to perform the operations of the communications method of any one of claims 1-9, or the operations of the communications method of any one of claims 10 to 14, or the operations of the communications method of any one of claims 28 to 30.

32. An access network device, comprising:

at least one processor, a memory for storing instructions for the management device to communicate with other devices, and a transceiver, the stored instructions being executed directly or indirectly by the at least one processor to cause the access network device to perform the operations of the communication method of any one of claims 15 to 18.

33. A terminal device, comprising:

at least one processor, a memory for storing instructions for the management device to communicate with other devices, and a transceiver, the stored instructions being executed directly or indirectly by the at least one processor to cause the terminal device to perform the operations of the communication method of any one of claims 19 to 25, or the operations of the communication method of claim 26 or 27.

34. A computer-readable storage medium, characterized in that the computer-readable storage medium stores a computer program which, when executed, implements the communication method of any one of claims 1 to 9, or the communication method of any one of claims 10 to 14, or the communication method of any one of claims 15 to 18, or the communication method of any one of claims 19 to 25, or the communication method of claim 26 or 27. Or 28 to 30.